Your Love Is My Drug
by ArentYouSophiaLoren-8887
Summary: A Valentine's Day Dance at Degrassi quickly spirals out of control, and might have fatal consequences for someone by the night's end.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note: Posted this story about a month ago, then took it down. Decided to repost again, because I liked it too much to just throw away. **

"A little higher on the left," Jenna instructed.

From her position on the ladder, Clare threw her an exasperated look. "You keep telling me that," she snapped.

"Because it's crooked," Jenna insisted. "Just move it up like a half an inch more, Clare-Bear."

Clare whirled around and inspected her efforts from atop the ladder. "It looks fine from here," she said stubbornly, hands on her hips.

"I'm telling you, it's crooked."

"Okay," Eli piped in. He stood mirror to Clare, on another ladder, holding the right side of the banner in his hand. "Why don't we do this. Jenna can help me hang this, and Clare can be the monitor. Alright? Or else we'll never get this hung, and I wanna go home."

"I thought you wanted to help me decorate the school for Valentine's Day," Clare said.

Eli rolled his eyes. "It's only fun to think about your own Valentine's Day with your amazing, wonderful, sexy girlfriend. Everybody else's, I don't really care about."

"Eli!"

"Okay," Jenna relented. She motioned for Clare to step down. "Fine. We'll trade. K.C.'s mom is going to be here any minute to pick me up."

Jenna scrambled up the ladder and grabbed her end of the banner, as Clare stepped about ten feet back to observe their efforts. "How's it looking now, Clare-Bear?"

Clare shielded her eyes under the fluorescent lights and studied their work. "A little more on your side, Jenna," she called.

Across from her, Eli snickered.

Jenna made a face at him. "Oh, shut up."

He threw up his hands playfully, still grinning to himself.

"Jenna, just another inch or so on your side, and it should be alright," Clare called.

"Why not just make Eli lower his?" Jenna snapped back.

"I got it," Eli whispered. Stepping down a rung, he lowered his edge, and tacked the banner to the wall. "That good?" he called to Clare.

She threw him a thumbs-up. "C'est magnifique!" she smiled. She came over to them and reached for Eli, who bent down to her from his perch. Stepping on the tips of her toes, she closed her eyes as their lips met for a kiss as bright as a bride's blush.

Jenna looked away, fiddling with the straps on the banner and trying not to feel like a voyeur. She could feel her heating up as the couple beside her didn't pull away- in fact, they didn't even seem to remember she was there.

Suddenly, her pocked buzzed, and she grabbed her phone to check the new message.

"Oh, come on," she groaned.

Clare broke away from the kiss for a moment to look at her. "Everything alright?"

Jenna rolled her eyes and shoved her phone back in her pocket. "No. K.C. just texted me to tell me that he's staying at Drew's for dinner. _Again." _ She sighed. "He _knows_ Thursday nights are _our_ dinner nights. It's the only night that Lisa doesn't have to work, so she watches the baby while we go out to dinner. But the past two weeks, all he's done is hang out with his friends. He's almost _never_ home anymore, even on school nights."

Clare gave her a sympathetic look. "Have you told his mom? She might talk to him about sticking around more."

Jenna shook her head. "I did," she replied. "And Lisa said she'd bring it up. But that only makes K.C. mad, and he started getting into a lot of fights with his mom." She leaned against the wall tiredly. "I know that Lisa's right, but she made K.C. feel like we were ganging up on him. And right now, I need all the help I can get, so it's just easier if I keep my mouth shut."

"That's not fair to you, though," Clare argued. "He's Jordan's dad; he should help raise her."

"In theory," Jenna said drily.

Eli, his arms still wrapped around Clare, gave Jenna a compassionate look.

"Hang in there," he said gently. "You're being a good mom. Keep focusing on her; K.C. will come around in time."

"Yeah," Jenna mumbled. "I really hope so."

Her phone buzzed again. Expecting another text from K.C., she checked and saw it was from Lisa; she was here to pick her up. With a sigh, Jenna shrugged into her enormous overcoat and hoisted her bag over her shoulders. "Later, guys," she called.

Clare and Eli both waved to her. "Thanks for your help!" Clare called after her.

Lisa's car was pulled right in front of the gym; Jenna gingerly stepped her way through the muck of slush and muddy snow at her feet, nearly slipping and falling on her behind as the sole of her boot tread over a patch of ice right near the car.

The woman grinned at her as she scrambled inside. "Brrrr," she teased. "It is _freezing_ out there. Thought my nose would turn into an icicle and freeze off just walking from work to the car."

"Yeah," Jenna agreed. She turned around in her seat and saw Jordan in her car seat, bundled up in a pink snow outfit that made her look like a microwaved marshmallow.

"Hi, munchkin," she called brightly. "Did you miss your mommy?" She leaned into the backseat and kissed her daughter's forehead. "I missed you all day long."

Lisa smiled at her. "I hope you and K.C. are getting something hot for dinner tonight," she said. "It's only supposed to get colder tonight."

Jenna frowned. "You'll have to ask Mrs. Torres what they're having," she muttered. "He's staying at Drew's for dinner."

"Again?" Lisa said incredulously. "But it's Thursday. I thought Thursday was your date night."

Jenna shrugged, staring out the window. "Guess not."

Lisa focused her eyes on the road, but kept peering over at her concernedly. "Do you want me to talk to him?" she asked.

Jenna shook her head. She knew that he would only get mad; as much as she was pissed he was bailing on their only night to spend together, she would talk to him about it herself. Involving his mother would only make him mad and defensive, and they'd just get into a big fight that would leave both of them nowhere.

"Are you sure?"

She nodded. "I'll talk to him myself."

"Okay," Lisa said, but didn't sound too convinced.

Jenna couldn't exactly blame her. Things were pretty tense at home lately; it hadn't been easy on any of them, especially Lisa, who often got stuck in the middle of their fights.

She sighed, frustrated. She had thought moving in with her boyfriend would be easier than this.

Right before Jordan had been born, they had talked about it, and both of them had agreed that neither of them were ready for that just yet- not to mention Kyle didn't want her moving almost forty minutes away. But when Jordan was three months old, it just seemed easier to move in together. It was so complicated, trying to work out where the baby would stay on what nights with whom, and since Kyle didn't allow K.C. to stay the night, the pinballing from house to house and the instability of never knowing what was happening day to day had caused them too much stress. So while Kyle disliked the idea of Jenna taking the baby and moving in with K.C., even he had to admit that it was probably the best plan. Now, at least, both parents would be living under one permanent roof.

It looked like the best possible solution, and on paper seemed to kill multiple birds with one stone. The transportation issues were solved. No more moving baby stuff- or the baby- back and forth nearly every night of the week. Knowing that they had a steady roof over their heads brought peace of mind to two already-overstressed teen parents. And most importantly, it was best for Jordan to have a permanent place to live, instead of being bounced from house to house- something K.C. was dead-set against, given the group facilities and foster homes he had spent his youth in and out of, like a revolving door.

Things had been alright at first, and it was nice not having to house-hop all the time, but Jenna knew that the strain of living under roof with an infant was really beginning to wear on both of them. Not only did they not have jobs yet (both had been applying since before Jordan was born, but it seemed like nobody was hiring _anywhere)_ and were entirely dependent on Kyle and Lisa for support, but the stress of school, money, and having a baby was grinding away at what little stability they had. It seemed to Jenna like all they did lately was fight.

Because neither one of them wanted to argue in front of the baby, they tried their best to be civil at the very least, but Jenna thought that was even worse. It was like living in a pressure cooker. Both of them just bit their tongues and turned away; instead of facing their troubles and talking things over, they just made little passive-aggressive stabs at one another that only led to bruised feelings and bad tempers.

Neither one of them would say a single word, yet at the same time, they were both determined to have the last one.

When they reached a red light, Lisa glanced once more at Jenna, and then looked in the backseat at Jordan, nodding off in her car seat.

She turned back to Jenna with a smile. "We'll have our own dinner tonight," she promised. "I've wanted to make lasagna for awhile. We could have a regular Italian dinner, just us girls." She turned back to Jordan and squeezed her foot. "Right, baby? You, me, and Mommy, all gonna have a girl's night?"

Jordan made an indistinguishable sound, and Lisa turned back to her with a grin. "Sounds like she likes the plan."

Jenna tried to smile back, but all she could think about was how much K.C. seemed to be one foot out the door these days.


	2. Chapter 2

**I.**

K.C. poked his head into the doorway of the kitchen.

"Knock, knock," he called, grinning at her. "You decent?"

She didn't look up from her history homework. "What's going on?"

He walked over to her and bent down to give her a kiss. "Can't a guy say hi to his cute girlfriend-slash-babymama?"

"K.C.," she snapped impatiently, pushing him away. "I just took a shower. You smell like a gym locker."

"I just got home from basketball, Jenna," he replied, sounding hurt and confused. "What is it with you?"

She didn't answer, just turned back to her homework, not meeting his eyes.

K.C. still remained standing beside her seat. "Are you still made about missing dinner the other night?" he asked.

Jenna rolled her eyes. "What do you think?"

He frowned. "I told you; Drew's mom just assumed I was staying for dinner. I didn't want to be rude."

"And what about last week?" she demanded.

"Again, I told you; Coach scheduled an extra basketball practice before the big game! I didn't want to miss our dinner night, but that's just how it happened!"

"Oh really?" Jenna scoffed. "Because it seems like something always just seems to 'come up' every time you and I make plans together, lately."

"So you think I'm just walking out on you?" he replied. His voice rose like heat, and she could see his hands ball into fists at his sides.

"Lower your voice," she replied evenly. Her eyes flickered to Jordan, who was sitting in her baby seat in the corner, watching her parents with a wide-eyed, curious expression.

K.C.'s eyes followed hers, and he immediately took a step away from the kitchen table, turning away from her as he curled and uncurled his fists.

"What do you want me to do, Jenna?" he asked quietly, his back still to her.

She gazed at Jordan, studying them intently from her swing. Sighing, she went over and picked up their daughter, joggling her against her hip.

"I need to know that you're still with me in all this," she told him.

K.C. turned around to face her, his eyes wide.

"Are you serious?" he asked incredulously. "Who's stayed with you in spite of everything? Who's been a dad to that girl every day of her life? Who are you sleeping with every night?" He shook his head. "What more do I need to DO for you, Jenna?"

She looked him dead in the eyes. "Be with me."

"I am," he fired back. "I'm just not sure your definition of being with you is the same as mine."

He turned and walked away without another word, leaving Jenna standing alone, with Jordan in her arms.

**II.**

"How'd you guys do on Perino's test?" Alli asked.

Clare shrugged. "I don't know. I think I did alright. I mean, I know I got some stuff right, but I totally froze on the whole mini-essay we had to write on the Gallipoli Campaign. And I looked back in my notes and definitely got that question about Neville Chamberlain wrong."

Alli rolled her eyes. "I asked for a simple 'good' or 'bad', Clare, not a term paper." She peered around Jenna, who was taking a lackluster bite of her chicken salad sandwich. "How about you, Miss Mopey?"

Jenna barely glanced up. "What?" she mumbled.

Alli grinned. "Hello, earth to Jenna. Come in, Jenna."

"Alli," she snapped warningly.

Clare looked over at her. "Was the baby up all night again?" she asked sympathetically.

Jenna shook her head. "No," she yawned. "I was dealing with a different baby last night." At Alli and Clare's puzzled faces, she sighed. "The one that's much taller, stronger, and thankfully doesn't wear diapers but still manages to bring a lot of shit into my life anyway."

Alli frowned. "More K.C. drama?" she guessed.

Jenna nodded.

"I thought you were going to talk to him about that," Clare asked.

She shrugged. "I tried."

Clare gave her a probing expression. "And?"

"And," Jenna replied, "that's it. I tried, I failed. Not really a story there."

"So what exactly happened?" Clare asked.

"I don't really want to talk about it."

"But don't you think this is something kind of important?" Clare asked gently. "I mean, all we hear is how hard is on you, because you guys never talk. But here you had this great moment to, and it sounds like you didn't even try."

"I did try!" Jenna snapped, so loudly that several people from other tables turned around to give her questioning looks. She took a deep breath, trying to ignore the burning in her cheeks, and looked determinedly at her two friends.

"I did try," she began again. "I did. You guys just have no idea how hard this is; especially with Jordan. Everything I do has to be all about her. You have NO idea how stressful that is, so just don't start with me, okay?"

Both girls looked like they wanted to say more, but Jenna dropped her eyes and dug into her food, effectively closing the topic, so they followed suit and finished their lunch in silence.

When the bell rang dismissing them to class, Clare grabbed Jenna's arm before she could leave. "Wait."

Jenna tried to whirl away. "I'm gonna be late for class."

"This'll only take a minute," Clare pressed. "Look, I'm sorry about what happened. You're right; it's not our business. But Jenna," she added, "if you really want to get anywhere with this, you should talk to him. Really talk- as in, sit him down, talk to him, one-on-one." Her expression was soft. "You two will never get anywhere if you don't. And it's not good for Jordan, either."

Jenna's face fell, and she could tell Clare knew she'd really struck a nerve. She _was _right; as usual. It wasn't doing her or Jordan any good to not work on things with K.C. Her baby needed a father; Jenna needed him in her life.

"What if he doesn't want to listen?" she whispered.

Clare gave her arm a quick squeeze. "Then make him listen. For all three of you. Whatever it takes."

**III.**

"We need to talk."

K.C. peered at her from around his locker door. "The words every guy dreads," he joked nervously.

She stood her ground. "K.C."

He rolled his eyes. "Jenna, do we really have to do this now? I can't be late for calc."

"Yes, we do," she said firmly.

"Why?" he demanded. "Why do we have to do this right now?"

"Because there's no other way to get you to listen to me!" she hissed. She reached out and grabbed his arm, forcing him to halt.

He glared at her. "Okay. Fine. I'm listening. Talk."

"You need to make more time for me," she told him.

K.C. rolled his eyes. "Not this again…"

"I'm serious! You're so busy going from one thing to the next, you're hardly ever home, and when you are, you never want to do anything! You barely even _see_ Jordan! And every time I try to get a spare second with you, all you do is rush out the door!"

K.C. jerked his arm away.

"How about," he said slowly, in a voice that didn't sound like his own, "you and everybody else get the hell off of my back!"

She suddenly felt her stomach drop at the fierce look on his face. She'd never been afraid of him before, but she found herself stepping back a few steps away from his looming, thunderous expression.

His yell ripped through the quiet halls. "How about you realize how hard it is for me? Being a dad, being in high school, still trying to do everything like everybody else…"

"How the hell do you think that's any different from what I feel?" she cut in.

"And at the same time, to have you and Jordan to take care of?" he went on, as if she had never spoken. "But instead of supporting me, all you do is complain about how I never have enough to give you! What else do you _want_ from me? Huh? What is it that anybody WANTS?"

"K.C.," Jenna began, but was cut off by another voice-

"What the hell is going on out here?"

Mr. Perino and Ms. Oh were coming towards the two of them; Perino had his hands on his hips with an expression of disbelief, whereas Ms. Oh just looked seriously annoyed.

"Sir," Jenna began, but Perino silenced her with a wave of the hand.

"Spare me the gory details of the latest episode of _Maury_, Miss Middleton," he said. "Just turn around and head on down to the principal's office. You, too, Mr. Guthrie."

"But, sir!" he protested

"No buts," Perino snapped. "Ms. Oh will make sure you go and don't disrupt any more classes with your domestic spats."

Ms. Oh stepped forward. "Follow me," she said sternly.

**IV.**

"Ms. Middleton," Mr. Lowry quipped when she arrived to class nearly twenty minutes late. "So glad of you to join us. Please, take a seat and don't even try to explain why you were late."

"Sorry," she mumbled. "Mr. Simpson said he had to talk to me about something."

"Feel free to enlighten all of us later," he said drily. "Come talk to me after class."

She sidled into her seat, face flaming.

Mr. Lowry turned back to the class. "Now, going back to what Jonathan said about symbolism. Do you think there's actual symbolism in the title itself? Think about it. _The Tempest. _The tempest began all the events of the book. What do you think Shakespeare meant by making this the title? What's the significance of this?"

Jenna slunk deeper into her seat, focusing on the words on the page, and trying to ignore the stares of the rest of her classmates.

Beside her, Dave leaned in closer. "Hey," he whispered, "everything alright?"

She shrugged. "I don't know."

He grabbed his book and pointed to the page number. "Well, we can at least be on the same page."

Jenna signed. "I wish," she muttered.

"Miss Middleton!" Mr. Lowry called out, making her jump. "Mr. Turner! Care to share your thoughts on the symbolism of the tempest?"

"No, sir," they both intoned.

"Well if you don't have anything to say, then why are you still talking?"

**V.**

"Hey," Alli called, catching up to her in the hallway after school. "I heard about the drama earlier. What happened?"

Jenna shrugged her arm away. "I don't really want to talk about it."

Alli gave her a pained grimace. "Was it really that bad?"

"How did you even know about that?" she asked, irritated.

"It was all anyone was talking about this afternoon." She rolled her eyes. "Don't worry, I shut up some little niner girls who were snapping their jaws about it in the caf. Just call me your Knight in Shining Armour."

Jenna turned away from Alli and looked into her locker. Tears prickled in the back of her eyes. Great. Now the whole school was talking about the resident Baby Momma and Baby Daddy drama. She knew she hadn't been imagining all the stares and whispers. Wiping her eyes with the back of her hand, she slammed her locker shut so hard that Alli jumped.

"Can we please just not?" she snapped. Her eyes were still stinging with tears, and she swallowed mightily, trying to fight back the sob lodged there.

Alli's eyes widened. Gently, she reached out and touched Jenna's arm. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean anything. I was just worried about you. I know you were really stressed already. I wanted to make sure everything was okay." She frowned. "Everything _is_ okay, right?"

Jenna tried to speak, but found she couldn't; tears leaked out of her eyes, and she just hung her head, unable to meet her friend's concerned eyes.

Alli slipped her arm around Jenna and began guiding her down the hallway. Even though she couldn't bring herself to look up, Jenna could still feel the curious eyes of her classmates on her, hearing their mutters to one another, scratchy and indistinct as they crept like mice along the floor.

Alli herded her to an empty classroom and sat her down in one of the desks, pulling her own closer so she could rest her hands on Jenna's knees. Reaching into her purse, she handed Jenna a wad of tissues, which she took gratefully.

"Now," Alli said, "take a deep breath, and tell me what happened."

She told her everything- her argument with him the night before, what K.C. had said to her about being with her, their fight in the hallway, and the brief fear she'd had that K.C. might actually be capable of laying his hands on her.

Alli's eyes widened. "You don't actually think he'd do something like that, do you? Because, yeah, K.C. can be a real jerk, but I don't know if he'd actually do _that. _But if he is, you need to tell someone. Like, right now. Before something really _does_ happen."

Jenna sniffled. "I don't think he would," she said.

Alli leaned closer. "Are you sure?" she stressed. At Jenna's look, she sighed. "Look, Jenna, I hate to bring this up, but you know…he sort of does have a record."

"For stealing a car," she replied. "And that was almost three years ago. That doesn't even have anything to do with this."

"But he _does_ have a record of violent behavior," Alli argued. "Look, I know that he has his cutesy boyfriend moments with you, but you didn't know him before you came to Degrassi. He got into a lot of trouble for anger management stuff. He's flipped out before, and it really scared the crap out of Clare when they were dating. Plus," she added, "I hate to say this, but guys who have abusive parents and witnessed that kind of stuff growing up _are _known to be abusive when they're older."

Jenna jerked away from Alli. "Well, you're wrong," she stated coldly. She got to her feet unsteadily. "K.C.'s never hit me. Or Jordan. He'd never do something like that."

Alli held her hands up, a gesture of surrender. "Okay, okay," she retracted. "_Mea culpa."_

"No," Jenna demanded. "Where do you get off saying something like that? Do you think I would ever let someone like that around my baby? He would never touch either of us. I would never let him in Jordan's life if I thought he could do something like that to her. Do you think I'm stupid?"

"Jenna," Alli pleaded, "look, I'm sorry. I didn't mean that he actually _did._ I'm just worried about you! And so is Clare. We both just want to make sure that you and the baby are okay."

"Well, we are," she said flatly. Hauling her bag on her shoulder, she brushed past Alli, purposely knocking into her. "You have no idea what you're talking about."

"Jenna!" Alli called after her. "Jenna, please! I'm sorry! Just, wait, please!"

Jenna ignored her, storming out the door without looking back.

**V.**

The Dot was packed with the regular afterschool crowd of Degrassi students, but Jenna spotted Clare at a table in the back. She was with Eli, apparently in deep conversation, their hands intertwined and their heads bent over two cups of coffee and a cinnamon bun. Without preamble, Jenna marched over to them.

Eli glanced up from their conversation, catching her eye over Clare's head. He gave her a surprised look as he took in her disheveled, red-faced, anxious expression. "Well, hello there."

"Hi," she said breathlessly.

Clare turned around, her eyes widening in the same surprised, worried way Eli's had.

"Jenna," she said. "Umm…everything okay?"

She took a deep breath. "Is it alright if I speak to you for a minute?" she asked. Her eyes met Eli's. "In private?"

Clare's eyebrows raised, but she turned back to Eli and gave him a pointed look.

Eli got up from the table. "I think I'm gonna go get another cappuccino," he told them, heading for the countertop.

Jenna pounced on his vacated seat.

"What happened?" Clare whispered frantically. "Is everything okay?"

"I need you to tell me something," Jenna replied. "And I need you to be completely honest with me."

Clare nodded, too surprised to do anything else.

"Was there-" she began, then paused. Did she really want to know this?

"Was there ever a time…back when you and K.C. were, you know, dating…" it was awkward to say that, even now, when both of them had clearly moved on past their drama freshman year, "that you were ever…afraid of him? Or worried about yourself, when you were around him?"

Clare's jaw dropped. "Has he done something to you? Or the baby?"

"No, no, no," she hurried. "No, it's nothing like that. But…look, you heard about what happened earlier today, right?"

"Sort of. Rumors. I didn't really pay attention to it; it's not my business, anyway. Why? What happened?"

Jenna shook her head. "We both got into an argument. I guess the hallway before class wasn't the best time to have a serious talk, but I just wanted to get him to listen to me. And now, he won't talk to me."

Clare looked confused. "So, where does this whole fear thing come into play?"

Jenna couldn't meet her eyes. She took the napkin crumpled on the table top and twirled it around her fingers.

"Jenna," Clare said firmly. "Tell he what happened, or else I can't help you."

"He just…he didn't look like himself." Her voice was barely above a whisper, and she refused to look at her. She focused instead on shredding the napkin in her hand to little bits. "Like, I've seen him pissed off before, but this was the first time I've ever seen him truly _angry_. And…it really scared me."

Clare reached over and grabbed her hand. "What did you see?" she asked.

Jenna finally met her eyes, and saw the knowing compassion that was there.

She took a deep breath. "I saw a side of him that I thought might be capable of something bad. Something really scary. And…I need to know more about it. What happened with K.C.- you know, before?"

Clare sighed. "Do you really want to know?"

Jenna really didn't but knew she ought to.

"Okay," Clare said. "Well, the good news is, he was never bad like that. Up until...up until you, he was always good to me. Even though he had his moments, he was a good boyfriend. And he never, ever touched me like that. Not once. And believe me, if I thought he could have done that, I would have been long gone before you came into the picture."

Well, that was a relief to hear, although part of Jenna knew that no matter how strong Clare's feelings might have been for K.C., she never would have stayed with him if he had laid his hands on her. But Alli's words were still in her mind, and she had to know what Clare wasn't telling her.

"But there was more," she pressed. "Something else. Other things that happened that made you worried?"

Now, it was Clare's turn to not want to meet her eyes.

"Yeah," she muttered after a moment. "There was."

At Jenna's look, she continued. "It was all about this guy on their Grade 9 basketball team. Reese. He was a jerk to everyone, but K.C. especially. He would get on his nerves a lot just to aggravate him. But he came up to us once in the hallway, and told me all about K.C.'s juvie record and how he lived in a group home."

"He never told you himself?" Jenna was shocked. That was one of the first things she and K.C. had discussed when they got together- their families. She couldn't imagine him keeping such a big secret from his girlfriend.

"He was scared. He didn't want me to write him off as a bad boy and not want to take a chance on him. I knew of him as a good guy, and he didn't want me to judge him for what he used to do. Anyway, this kid, Reese, he came up and told me with K.C. standing right there. The only person that K.C. had told was Connor, and that was only because Connor showed up at his group home, so he couldn't hide it anymore. But Reese found out, and K.C. got really mad."

Clare paused. "He didn't hit Reese," she went on, "but he charged at him, and for a second, I thought he really would beat him up. But all he said was that Connor was dead, and then he ran off."

Oh, god. "So he beat up Connor?"

Clare shook her head. "No. He was mad at him, but he didn't hit him. He never did."

Jenna still didn't feel entirely reassured. "Was there anything else? Any other time?"

"No, that was really the worst of it," she said. She still looked concerned. "Jenna, look, I know that it's more difficult for you because you have Jordan, but if there's any time that you're really worried, you need to _leave_. Get your daughter out of there and away from him."

"You said yourself that he never hit anyone," Jenna argued.

"But the point was, I saw that he _could have_," Clare replied. "I saw that he was ready to beat that Reese kid to the ground. And later on, I found out that the only reason he didn't hit him was because his group home leader told him that if there was one more violent incident on his record, he would get sent straight to juvie."

Jenna sat back in her chair, unable to think straight. K.C. had alluded to being in fights in the past, but he had never really been specific. He didn't talk about his past life much beyond the most basic facts- abusive parents, group home life, tons of foster families, stealing that car, police record. She knew that things had been pretty terrible for him, though, and Jenna had been with K.C. long enough to see the scars, both visible and not, of the things he _wasn't_ telling her.

She had seen the burn marks on the insides of his legs, from where his father stubbed out his cigarettes on his thighs when he was just a toddler; she knew where the scars were from when that man had taken his belt to K.C.'s bare skin. She knew about the times his mother had shut him in a closet while she went out to get high, leaving K.C. locked in the dark with no food or water for hours.

And she also knew about the thing that he had never told anybody else.

It had happened when Jordan had only been a few days old. She and K.C., both exhausted and overwhelmed by the demands of a newborn, were lying on his bed with the baby on his chest, a bottle on the nightstand for when she inevitably woke up screaming later, whether it be in two minutes or two hours. Their hands had been intertwined, and her head slumped on his shoulder, too exhausted to move.

She wasn't sure if it had been how dead-tired they were or how emotional they had both been lately, but K.C. had told her something that he swore he had never told another soul, ever.

In the semi-darkness of his bedroom, holding her hand and refusing to look at her, he'd whispered to her the things that his mother's drug dealer had sometimes done to him. The way that his mother had allowed him to do those things to her son, because she had been too fucked up and strung out and desperate for the drugs she couldn't afford any other way.

The way that K.C, too small and helpless to fight back, could only stand there in mute humiliation and terror, as the man put his hands all over him- _inside _him.

The knowledge of what that horrible, disgusting man had done to him- only a helpless child- made her feel feverish, both now and then, and made her skin crawl with revulsion and horror. She knew that Lisa had changed, and wouldn't trade her support and encouragement for anything now that she was a mother, too. She knew that she shouldn't judge people by their past mistakes, but knowing how she had allowed her son to be hurt that way- and willingly did it, just to get her hands on more drugs- made her suddenly want to take her baby and run far, far away from this house, the home of the woman who had watched her son's torment and had done nothing to stop it.

Jenna realized that tears were now coursing down her face. She gave Clare a helpless look, before burying her face in her arms and crumbling on top of the table.

A hand gently brushed across her back, and Jenna glanced up.

Eli was looking at her in concern. "Maybe we should take this somewhere else," he whispered . "Somewhere more private."

From across the table, she could see Clare nodding fervently to him. She got up from her own seat and helped Jenna out of hers, putting an arm around her as she and Eli guided her out of The Dot and to the parking lot where Eli's hearse sat idly.

**VI.**

Hours later, after Eli and Clare had let her cry and comforted her, they dropped her off back at K.C.'s mother's apartment. Her face was still tear-streaked and swollen, and there was a throbbing in her temples that refused to abate, no matter how much Advil she swallowed.

Before walking into the apartment, she pressed her head to the coarse, un-sanded wood of the door, letting the pressure soothe her pounding head. She desperately wanted to crawl into bed and fall into deep sleep, but she had to take care of the baby, and by now. K.C. would be home from practice. Unless he had decided to stay out and avoid her and another confrontation.

For once, she wished he had chosen to be irresponsible.

Taking a deep breath, she swung the door open, hanging up her coat and dropping her school bag in the corner.

"You're home late," came a voice, startling her.

K.C. was sitting on the couch, watching the TV on mute. Jordan rested in his arms, asleep, and a half-drunk bottle of formula was on the coffee table.

"Yeah," Jenna muttered. "I, um, spent some time with Eli and Clare. I had dinner with them. Sorry, I didn't know you ordered pizza."

He shrugged without taking his eyes off the television. "If you don't want it, I'll probably just take it for lunch tomorrow."

Jenna stood there awkwardly, not sure what else to say.

"What are you watching?" she said finally.

Again, he shrugged, gaze fixed on the screen. "I dunno. It's always on."

A long pause, then, "I'm sorry for today."

His eyes met hers, and she could see even in the dim half-light of the apartment that his eyes were rimmed red, too.

All the anger she'd felt building inside her all day long deflated; just like that, she felt the tension wash away like water. "I'm sorry, too. That wasn't the best time to talk."

"I'm really trying, you know," K.C. told her. Jordan moved in her sleep, and K.C. automatically shifted her weight in his arms.

Jenna came around the couch and sat beside him.

"I know you are," she said. "It's just…I wish you would try a little bit harder."

K.C. didn't answer her right away; instead, he looked down at Jordan's sleeping, peaceful face. Finally, he looked back into her eyes.

"What if this is the best I can do?" he whispered.

Jenna didn't have a reply for that.


	3. Chapter 3

**I.**

Alli caught up with her before school the next day, right before the bell rang.

"Hey, Jenna, Jenna! Wait up." She rushed up beside her, pushing through the throng of moving students. "I'm so, so sorry for yesterday I didn't mean to upset you, okay? I was just really worried."

"It's fine," Jenna replied tiredly.

Alli studied her face- the drawn expression, the pasty skin, the bags under her eyes. "What happened? You look terrible."

"Thanks," she said drily.

"Jenna."

She sighed, falling back against her locker. "Nothing happened. K.C. and I were up all night with the baby. She had a fever."

"Is she alright now?"

"No. She was still sick this morning; Lisa stayed home from work to take care of her because I had a French test and a Trig test today and I can't get any farther behind or else I'll fail both classes."

Alli grimaced. "That sucks. I'm really sorry."

"Yeah," she muttered.

The warning bell sounded, letting the students know that class would start in five minutes. Jenna grabbed her book out of her locker for her first period class, while Alli fidgeted beside her.

"So," Alli began nervously, "um, does this mean that we're forgiven for yesterday?"

Her words from yesterday still stung, but Jenna knew deep down Alli had just been looking out for her. She'd never intentionally hurt her feelings; she was just trying to be a good friend. "Yeah."

"Good," Alli breathed a sigh of relief. "Cause with that Valentine's Day dance on Saturday, I am definitely going to need a shopping buddy and someone to do hair and make-up with that night. Clare's already been commandeered to a special romantic dinner with Eli, and they're riding in the Death Star 2.0 to the dance." She rolled her eyes. "How's _that_ for romance is dead?"

When Jenna paused, Alli deflated a bit. "Unless," she said quietly, "you already made plans with K.C. Of course. You probably did."

"No," Jenna replied. "It's not that. It's just…I forgot all about the dance, really. With all the drama going on between me and K.C., I haven't been thinking about much else."

"Oh," Alli said brightly. "Well, I don't know if you and Baby Daddy are planning on going, but I definitely need someone to hang with that night. I mean, nothing's more depressing than being alone on Valentine's Day, right?"

Jenna tried for a smile. "Right."

The second bell rang, signaling one minute until class.

"I really need to get going, Ms. Oh will definitely waterboard me if I'm late again," Alli joked. She gave Jenna a quick hug. "Text me later. We need to make dance plans."

She nodded. "Definitely."

Alli rushed away to class, tossing a wave over her shoulder as she darted towards the M.I. lab.

Jenna headed to her own classroom, thinking about the dance. She couldn't believe she'd forgotten about it, and now it was only three days away.

As excited as Alli was about this thing, she wasn't sure she wanted to go. Even though they had reached a tentative peace last night, she and K.C. were still on rocky ground. Besides, the baby was getting sick, and she was already falling behind on her schoolwork- if she had to stay home and take care of Jordan, she would miss even more school, and fall even more behind. Everything was just hectic right now, and going to a stupid dance was low on the list of things she really wanted to do right now.

Then again, maybe this was just what she needed.

She and K.C. had both been so stressed. They hadn't spent any time with each other in weeks. They were both running around in circles, and they never had time to breathe. Maybe a silly high school dance was just what she needed, to unwind and get their fishtailing relationship back on track.

**II.**

"Hey," she caught up with K.C. right before study hall period. "You have a minute?"

He looked at her in irritation. "If this is a replay from yesterday, than no, I don't. I just want to go to study hall and fall asleep on my physics book, not go to Simpson's office."

"It's not about that," she rushed. "It's about Saturday night. What are you doing then?"

"Nothing yet. Why? You wanna try and reschedule our date night?"

"Better." She pointed to the banner she, Clare, and Eli had hung up a few days earlier. "The Valentine's Day dance at Above The Dot. You and I should go. I think it would be good for us, you know? Get out of the house, spend a little time together, baby-free. We've both been so stressed lately; I think it'd be good to just go out and blow off some steam."

"Blow off some steam," K.C. repeated slowly. "I like the way that sounds."

"So you'll go with me?" Jenna asked.

K.C. smiled at her. "I would love to be your Valentine, Miss Middleton," he said, giving her a little bow. "If you would be mine."

His face tipped down towards hers, and she stretched up on her tiptoes, leaning in for a kiss.

"Ahem!"

They pulled away quickly, startled and flushed. Ms. Dawes stood in the hallway, her arms crossed and looking at them in mock-sternness.

"I trust you both know the school's no PDA-policy," she said."But…since Valentine's Day _is_ right around the corner," she added with a sly smile, "I think I'd be willing to let this one slide."

"Thanks, Ms. Dawes," Jenna mumbled. K.C. didn't reply; he just stared at the ground sheepishly.

"Now, that offer only stands if both of you get to class P.D.Q.," the teacher hinted.

They both nodded, darting off to their respective classrooms, and Jenna sidled into her seat right before the bell rang.

She still felt flushed, but for an entirely different reason this time.

**III.**

"So you're ditching me already?" Alli whined.

Jenna gave her a look. "Alli. He _is_ my boyfriend."

"Yeah, but who am I going to hang out with at the dance?"

"Clare's going, isn't she?"

"Please. She'll be glued to Eli all night long. She doesn't even have time to go outfit-shopping with me. He's been taking up all her time lately; I barely get a word in edgewise." She looked pleadingly at Jenna, batting her eyelashes. "Please, Jenna? Can't we at least, I don't know, pseudo-double date? Like, you dance half the time with K.C., and the other half with me?"

"If you really want to go with someone," Jenna asked, "why not ask Adam? Or Wesley? Or how about Dave? He used to be really into you."

Alli rolled her eyes. "Really, Jenna?"

"Look, all I'm saying is, don't get mad at me for ditching you on _Valentine's Day_ for my actual _boyfriend_. I'm not ditching anybody. I'll dance with you, okay? Promise. But this could be good for me and K.C.. It could really be the break we need. That we _desperately _need."

"What do you desperately need?" Clare asked. She came up and took the seat at the countertop beside Alli.

Alli groaned. "Baby Mama here just informed me she was dumping me in lieu of spending a romantic evening with her boyfriend on Valentine's Day." She buried her head in her arms. "Why am I always the one who ends up having to stress about who she's going to be with at dances? Am I, like, terminally single or something?"

Clare ignored her. "You're doing what with K.C.?"

"Going to the Valentine's Day dance," she replied.

"I didn't know you were doing that," Clare said in surprise. "You didn't mention it yesterday."

"Well, I sort of forgot all about it until today. I just asked him before study period."

Clare looked incredulous. "Are you sure that's a good idea?"

"Why wouldn't it be?" Jenna asked.

"Just yesterday, you were asking me about K.C.'s checkered past," she replied. "Now you're planning on going to a dance with him? Why does it _not_ sound like you listened to me at all yesterday?"

"I did listen to you, Clare-Bear," she argued. "You said that I needed to talk things over with K.C.. We did talk. We both agreed that we really needed this dance. It's going to be good for us to get out and be a normal couple for once, baby-free and all."

She took a slurp of her milkshake. "K.C. and I are gonna go to this lame dance, and be lame together. It's what we both need."

Alli buried her head in her hands again, muttering something about always being the fifth wheel; Clare still looked skeptical, but she didn't say anything else.

**IV.**

"Sorry, Jenna," Lisa told her. "I really wish I could take off, but you know Saturday nights are always so busy. Everybody goes out for dinner then; no way they'll let me take off. Besides, I can't turn down the tip money; no tax deductions, remember? Where do you think these diapers and formula come from?"

Jenna's face fell. "Are you sure?" she asked, knowing she sounded petulant and not caring.

Lisa gave her a stern look. "Look, I'm sorry that I can't just take off of work whenever you want a break, sweetheart, but that's what being a mom is! Even when you're in high school; even when things like this come up; even when there are a million other things you would rather be doing, you are still first and foremost a mother, and that's a 24/7 job."

Jenna stared down at her bare feet on the freezing tile, then at Jordan, sitting in her high chair and eating mashed sweet potatoes. Well, eating was a loose term- it was more like, she _had_ been eating them, but found it a lot more entertaining to spread them around her fingers and shampoo her hair with them.

"I just thought," she said in a small voice, "that this would be good for me and K.C.. All we do lately is fight; I thought it might be nice for us to get out of the house and just act normal, for one night."

Lisa gave her a sympathetic frown. "Oh, honey, I know. But that's part of being a parent; sometimes, you just can't put yourself first, or even your partner. It all has to be about the baby. And that's something that's so hard at your age."

Jenna nodded, swallowing her disappointment, knowing she was right.

"Why not Kyle?" Lisa suggested. "Maybe he can watch her."

She shook her head. "No. I already asked. Since his boss cut back his hours, he's picking up all the extra shifts he can get, so he can't afford to take any days off."

Lisa sighed. "Well, maybe something will come up and you guys can go," she said hopefully. "I'm sorry, sweetie."

"Yeah," Jenna muttered. "Me, too."

**V.**

"Please, Alli?"

"Jenna, I really don't think my parents are the best babysitting prospects."

"Why not?"

"Umm, because they're my parents? Because they haven't spent time with a baby since I was one? Because you know how judgey they are, and why would you want to let them watch your kid so you can go out and party?"

"It's not a party, Alli," she said, affronted. "It's a dance. School-sanctioned and everything."

"Yeah, with your Baby Daddy as your date." Alli rolled her eyes. "Come on, Jenna. With my parents' track record of being all "accepting", do you really think they'll be crazy about babysitting Jordan?"

Jenna put her forehead to the desk and groaned. "I'm so desperate for a baby-sitter right now, I really don't even care what they say."

"Well," Alli said, "I'm pretty sure asking my parents to babysit is out of the question. Why not just hire one?"

"Where are we going to get the money for that?" She raked her fingers through her hair. She had really hoped she and K.C. could have this one night together. They haven't been to a single dance since Jordan was born; they missed last year's Spring Fling because she had given birth the night before, and the night of their Grade 11 Homecoming had been spent in the ER- the baby had smacked her chin on the coffee table and needed to get stitches.

I just wanted one night for us to be normal teenagers again," she muttered. "Is that really so hard?"

Alli shrugged. "I guess if you have a baby," she replied.

**V.**

K.C. shook his head. "No way," he said.

Jenna put her hands on her hips. "Why not?"

He frowned. "Because it won't be a high school dance with a baby there," he said.

Jenna could hear the unspoken "duh" at the end of that statement.

"Well, sorry about it," she snapped. "But this is the kind of sacrifice that we make when we have a baby. Either we both go and bring Jordan with us or neither of us goes at all."

"What the hell are we going to do with a baby at a school dance?"

"We'll take turns," Jenna explained.

K.C. snorted. "Oh, that sounds like a great plan."

"I'm serious; listen. We'll take turns. One of us will watch the baby downstairs in the Dot; every half-hour, we'll trade off places. That way, each of us gets equal time to spend at the dance."

K.C. gave her a look as if he really thought she was crazy.

"I know it's not the perfect plan," Jenna said. "And I know it doesn't sound like much fun. But if you and I really want to make this night work, we're gonna have to do it differently than everyone else."

She looked at him with pleading eyes. She didn't want to sound like she was desperate enough to beg, but going to this dance meant more to her than anything else right now.

"Please, K.C., we both agreed how badly we need this night. I know it's not like you wanted it to be, but that's just part of what happens now."

K.C. folded his arms over his chest. "The point was to spend time together," he asked flatly. "Not with a baby and with our friends. We did this just so we could have a night to ourselves, as a couple."

"And we will," she promised.

"That's not happening if we bring the baby with us" K.C. snapped. "We'll be either watching her or at the dance. Either way, we won't be together."

"We'll spend time together there."

"And who's watching Jordan during this hypothetical time together?"

"I'll ask Clare. Or Alli. Someone can watch her for three minutes while we dance together." She looked up at K.C. "We both said how much we needed this. So, tell me…are you still willing to be my Valentine?"

K.C.'s frown tipped upward slightly. "You really want this, don't you?"

It wasn't really a question. "More than anything."

"And you want me to be there for you more."

"Definitely; yes."

K.C curled his lips into a rakish smirk. "Well, under such conditions, I'm not sure," he drawled, inching closer to her, "but…the girl in question might change my mind."

**VI.**

"So let me get this straight," Clare said slowly, as Eli stood, arms crossed over his chest, behind her. "You guys are going to bring the baby to the dance."

Jenna nodded.

"And take turns babysitting in The Dot," she continued, as if she couldn't believe it, "while the other one goes to the dance."

She nodded again, shifting Jordan in her lap; the baby was tugging on the end of her ponytail, and it was starting to hurt.

"And you want us," Clare finished, still sounding amazed, "to watch her for you while you and K.C. hang out."

"You make it sound like I'm forcing you to watch her all night," Jenna argued. "It's just going to be for one dance, Clare-Bear."

"A slow dance?" Clare pointed out shrewdly. Jenna blushed and looked away. "Jenna, that's not fair. I have a date, too. And I don't have a baby."

"It doesn't have to be a slow dance," she replied quickly. She swatted away Jordan's hand as the baby tried to tug on her earring. "It can be any dance. I just need one dance, Clare."

Jordan yelped, startling some people at a nearby table. She began whining and thrashing in Jenna's arms.

"Can you take her for a sec," she asked, holding her out to Clare. "I need to get her bottle out of my bag."

Eli held out his arms. "I got her," he said. Grabbing Jordan under her bottom, he hoisted her into his arms. "Hello, there, cutie."

Jordan still squirmed in his hold, but she caught a glimpse of the giant skull medallion hanging from his neck, and immediately tried to stuff it in her mouth.

"Careful she doesn't pull on that too hard," Jenna warned him. "She can choke you when she wants to."

"Well, it's not like _she_ can choke on it," Eli pointed out, bouncing Jordan.

Jenna rolled her eyes, rummaging through the diaper bag for a fresh bottle. "Oh, you would be surprised at what she can fit in her mouth these days," she said drily.

Eli smirked at Jordan and raised his eyebrows at Jenna, giving her a very mischievous smile.

"Oh, don't even," Jenna grumbled, finally finding a bottle at the bottom. She motioned for him to pass the baby back to her. Jordan latched onto her bottle, sucking greedily in loud gulps.

She stared down at the baby in her lap, then at Clare and Eli, across the table from her. "Is it so much to ask that I get one dance with my boyfriend on Valentine's Day?" she said softly.

Clare looked so crestfallen that Jenna knew she was weakening her resolve. She bounced Jordan on her knees and looked Clare in the eye. "Look, I promise, it will only be ONE dance. And it won't be a slow one; I'll let you both have those together. But is it really so much to give up three minutes of Valentines time to let me and K.C. have a dance together?"

Clare sighed. She glanced at Jordan, then Jenna, then back at the baby, who was sucking noisily on her bottle, and Jenna could tell her protests were crumbling.

"A small break," Clare relented. "Okay? Small. I'm not being babysitter. But, under the condition that you don't make me daycare for the night…I don't see the harm in letting you and K.C. have your Valentines moment."

Jenna set the baby in her stroller for a moment and flung her arms around Clare's neck.

"You really are a great friend, Clare-Bear," she murmured.


	4. Chapter 4

**I.**

"No, Jordan," Jenna said exasperatedly, grabbing her daughter's hands. "Don't do that."

Jordan yelped as Jenna tried to pry the napkins out of her palms. She waved her arms in the air, letting out a shriek so loud that several customers turned around to shoot her dirty looks.

Eli smirked at them. "She looks like she was having fun with those."

Jenna shot him a dirty look. "Can you please just pick them up before someone steps on them and I get sued for money I don't have?"

Eli chucked wryly. "Hey, I don't think it's a good idea to insult the person that will have your child's life in his hands at some point in the very near future."

"Eli." Clare rolled her eyes, and knelt to help pick up the fallen napkins.

Peter came over to their table, holding a new bushel of napkins. Taking hold of the now-empty container that Jordan had torn through moments ago, he stuffed if fresh with napkins, biting his lip to hide the laughter. Jenna couldn't blame him. She knew how they must look- two hapless teenage parents, dressed to the nines for a high school dance, with an infant in a baby stroller who just decimated an entire container of napkins while their backs were turned.

"She is getting big," Peter commented. He grinned at K.C. "Dude, pretty soon you're gonna be getting a shotgun."

K.C. rolled his eyes. "Trust me," he told him soberly, "you have NO idea how seriously I take that statement."

She bent down to kiss Jordan on her cheek. "Bye, punkin!" she cooed. "Mama will be back soon. Be good for Da-Da!"

She turned to K.C. "Alright. So. I will be back in exactly 30 minutes."

"I'll be counting."

**II.**

"How well do you really think this is going to work out?" Clare asked Alli.

Alli glanced around her hastily. Jenna had just run to the bathroom, and she was certain she wouldn't be overheard through the din of the music. Leaning in conspiratorially to Clare, she just shook her head.

Clare winced. "Yeah, me too."

"I'm totally for Jenna wanting to be normal for one night," Alli went on, "but this might be taking things a little too extreme."

Clare shrugged. "I guess that's just the name of the game from now on."

Alli suddenly looked over Clare's shoulder, and shook her head very slightly at her; Jenna appeared back at their sides.

"Ugh, that line for the bathroom is so long," she complained. "Now I feel like I have no time left on my shift."

"Shift?" Clare repeated. "You make it sound like work."

"Yeah," Alli put in. "This is a dance; we're supposed to be having fun!"

"Yeah," Jenna replied. "So let's start doing that; while I still have"- she reached into the front of her dress and pulled out her cell phone- "thirteen minutes left."

**III.**

"Seriously, K.C.?" Jenna moaned as she dug through the diaper bag. "I _told_ you to pack the extra change of clothes."

He jutted out his jaw sullenly. "I did," he insisted.

"Well, obviously not, it's not in here."

He crossed his arms over his chest, his face screwed into a small child's scowl that would have been forgivable at 6, but not so much at 16.

"Whatever," he mumbled. "It's not my fault. I'm going to the dance now."

She waved an arm at him dismissively, still rooting through the diaper bag even though she knew it was pointless. "Fine. Go."

**IV.**

"Awww, look," came a cruel, mocking voice from the doorway. "It's Barbie & Ken, with their little Kelly doll."

Jenna closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

"Bianca," she replied. "Surprised to see you out of the men's room."

K.C. snickered, choking a laugh under his breath.

Bianca put her hands on her hips and have them a haughty look. "Surprised to see you outside the nursery," she said smoothly. "Unless you're starting Kelly on Baby Mama lessons earlier than I thought."

Behind her, Owen rolled his eyes and touched Bianca's arm, tugging her back. "Whatever. Let's just go, Bee."

She brushed him off. "Just let me get something to drink." She strode up to the counter beside them; long-legged, coltish, proud, unapologetic.

Jenna rolled her eyes. "I'm just going to go now," she told K.C.. "I'll be back." She kissed Jordan, who was sitting on top of the counter, wholly absorbed in playing with the packets of Sweet n' Low (and occasionally throwing them on the floor). "Bye, Boo-Boo."

Owen raised his eyebrows and snickered at the sight of Jordan, trying to snatch a hold of K.C.'s tie and shove it in her mouth."Dude," he asked, "seriously, what's with the Rugrat?"

K.C. rolled his eyes. "You don't wanna know."

Jordan was now trying to make a grab for the chain around Owen's neck; K.C. snatched her hand back, and she let out a high-pitched squeal of protest.

Owen smirked at her. "Aww, you want this?" he joked. Taking the necklace off, he dangled it in front of her hypnotically.

Jordan stared at it, mesmerized, and reached out to grab it, but Owen snatched it away from her before she could. "Well, too bad. I don't need grubby baby hands all over it."

K.C. glared at him. "Dude, come on. Just let her see it; I don't need her screaming."

He laughed derisively at K.C., taking a sip of his coffee. "You're on your own there, Baby Daddy." He raised his eyebrows at Jordan over the rim of his mug. "Looks like she's having more fun with Bianca's handbag, anyways."

"Shit," K.C. muttered. He grabbed the handbag and held it above Jordan's head. She yelped in protest, causing several other customers to glare.

From behind the counter, Peter groaned. "Dude," he said, "I know that you have special circumstances and all, but you're causing more customer complaints now than I get all day long."

"Not my fault she's fussy," he snapped.

"Maybe not, but just try and keep her quiet, at least for another half-hour, when the after-dinner coffee rush ends. And get her off the counter; people already complained about that."

**V.**

"How's she doing?"

Jenna rolled her eyes. "She's fussy as hell," she complained. "She suddenly decided to be Cranky Baby tonight."

"Yeah, tell me about it." He fell into the seat at the counter beside her, resting his cheek on the cool tile. "I'm getting a headache, between her yells and that music."

Jenna nodded. For whatever reason, the baby had been fussy for the past hour or so, alternating between crying and yelling. Peter had come over to complain to her about the other customers, but Jenna snapped there wasn't a whole lot she could do about it; nothing she did seemed to quiet Jordan down. Finally, she'd ended up taking her into the handicapped bathroom, locking the door and letting her scream in private as Jenna tried on vain to soothe her. K.C. hadn't had much better luck, either- ten minutes into his shift, he'd texted Jenna, saying that she hadn't shut up since he took over.

In her lap, Jordan had finally quieted, enjoying her bottle in glassy-eyed, exhausted silence for the first time since this whole dance fiasco had started.

"Sorry this wasn't the dance you wanted," she mumbled.

K.C. snorted. "You can say that again."

Jenna's eyes welled with tears. What a mess this whole night had turned out to be. She'd wanted a perfect date night, and instead they were both fighting over a screaming baby who refused to be placated.

K.C. saw the dejected look on her face and instantly back-pedaled. "Hey," he rushed, "don't cry. This dance blew, but there'll be others."

She sniffled, wiping the back of her hand. "Not on Valentine's Day." She glanced down at Jordan, sucking on her bottle with glazed over, red-rimmed eyes. "We are really a bunch of freaks. We're not normal; who were we kidding."

K.C. reached over and grabbed her hand. "Well, that doesn't mean that this has to be a total fiasco," he said. "That offer for a dance still stands."

He pulled Jenna to her feet. "Would you still be willing to be my Valentine? For one special sweetheart dance?"

Jenna wiped her eyes dry. "Only if you are."

**VI.**

"She just had a bottle, so she should be pretty quiet," Jenna informed Clare. "She sometimes falls asleep after eating, so if she looks like she's tired, rubbing her earlobes helps her fall asleep. And if she did nap, that would be a huge help for us, FYI."

Clare nodded. "Anything else?"

Jenna shook her head. "Nope, that's about it." She smiled at her. "Thanks again, Clare-Bear, for doing this."

She waved to Jordan. "Bye, baby. Be good for auntie Clare and uncle Eli."

A little too gleefully, she turned away from them and bolted out the door towards the staircase. She knew she should feel some guilt about dumping her cranky baby on friends, but by now, she was so desperate for some time away from her that she didn't really care.

She wasn't going to feel guilty for this. This dance- this one moment with K.C., getting to act normal again, however fleeting it would be- was the very least of what she deserved.

K.C. was waiting for her at the gold-lit, heart-shaped archway leading into the dance. She could hear the thud of the bass, pounding its rhythm into her already-aching temples, but was shocked when K.C. got down on one knee and pulled a corsage from behind his back.

"For the most beautiful girl in school," he presented dramatically. "And the most perfect Valentine ever."

For a moment, she was absolutely speechless, staring at the red and white flower."Where…" she began.

K.C. grinned up at her. "I asked Eli to keep it in his car for me," he told her. "So that I could wait for just the right moment."

For the second time that night, Jenna's eyes filled with tears, but for a better reason. "K.C…."

He fumblingly attached the corsage to her wrist, then stood up and gave her a kiss. "I know this was the last way either of us expected to do this night," he said, "but I want you to know that I'm glad that you're my Valentine. I love you, Jenna."

Tears slipped, unlocked and uncontainable, down her cheeks. "Oh, K.C.," she whispered, "me, too."

He wrapped his arms around her, and she threw hers around his neck, kissing him with such a force that he responded by lifting her off her feet. He twirled her around as she clung to him, pouring all of the joy and relief she felt into their kiss as they gripped each other tightly under the archway's glowing golden heart.

Suddenly, Jenna's phone buzzed, startling the both of them. K.C. put her down, and Jenna reached into her dress, pulling her phone out and staring at it in disbelief.

"Oh, come on," she complained. "Clare, I _just_ left you guys, like, ten minutes ago."

"Can we just let it go?" K.C. whined. "Please? Just go and dance with me, Jenna, like we planned. Please? This is The Moment; Clare can handle her for just a minute more."

Jenna wanted to believe his puppy-dog eyes and pleading frown, but knew that Clare would be pissed off if she didn't go down there.

"Just, two minutes," she promised, as K.C.'s face fell. "Two minutes; that's all."

He glowered at her. "Yeah, the whole length of the dance we planned," he said. "You know what? Forget it. I'll go back in there myself. Have fun for the rest of the night, Jenna."

Jenna's jaw dropped. "K.C.!" she called after him. He stomped under the archway towards the multicolored crowd of students on the dance floor. "K.C.! What the hell!"

He refused to turn back.

Anger surged through her. What the hell? God, she could smack him right now. She wanted nothing more than to run after him and give him a piece of her mind, but her phone buzzed again- two more missed calls from Clare- and she knew that if she chased after him now, she'd end up starting something she'd regret.

"Fuck," she mumbled to herself, heading down the stairs towards the café. "Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck."

**V.**

She could hear Jordan before she saw her.

Before she had even reached the bottom of the stairwell, she heard it- a sound horrible enough to make her blood freeze. Her daughter's helpless wails, terrified and orchestral, throbbing through her own body like a pulse. The sound was shocking in its strength; never before had Jordan screamed like this, so desperate and vulnerable. Her stomach dropped, and her anger with K.C. suddenly melted away with the spreading wildfire of sheer panic.

"Oh, my god," she cried to herself. Breaking into a dead run and nearly slipping on the icy sidewalk, she plowed through the crowd of pedestrians and flung open the door of The Dot with all the force of a hurricane.

Clare was sitting at the countertop, clutching the baby as she screamed. Her daughter's face was beat red and screwed up in such an intense expression of agony that it raced through Jenna like a bullet. Beside her, Eli's eyes were wide, his face white with worry.

"What happened?" Jenna cried, running to Jordan's side.

"I don't know," Clare replied frantically. It was hard to hear her over the sound of Jordan's tormented weeping. "She's all sweaty and hot; I don't know what's wrong!"

"How long has she been crying?" Jenna snatched her daughter out of Clare's arms.

God, it felt like holding a hot water bottle. Her entire body was flushed and burning, and her tiny heartbeat hammered under her pink onesie, beating against Jenna in frenetic punches.

"Oh, god," she whimpered, as Jordan twisted madly in her arms, "her heart's pounding."

Eli's eyes widened with panic. "I'm gonna call 9-1-1," he said, rushing out the door with his cell in hand so he be heard over Jordan's screams.

In her arms, Jordan cranked up the wails even louder, screaming loud enough to break the sound barrier. Her chilled body was shining with sweat, and she was burning as if her blood was boiling in her veins. Tears poured down Jenna's face, splashing into Jordan's flaming skin. Her arms were shaking so badly she wasn't sure she could hold the baby safely anymore, but she wasn't about to set her down for a second. Jordan continued to scream in her ears, a horrible sound that cut her heart out with each decibel.

Clare's eyes were filled with tears. "What's wrong with her, Jenna?"

"I don't know!" she shrieked, growing hysterical. Her voice was so wobbly it didn't even sound like her. Strangled, tortured sobs escaped her, and suddenly her legs were ready to buckle. The world was spinning, and she felt as if she were being turned inside-out.

Eli dashed back to their side. "The ambulance is on their way," he announced. "They said they're only two minutes away."

Jenna's vision blurred. Her whole body trembled feverishly. Jordan began to scream even louder than before, and she thought she might be sick. "Oh, God…" she said again.

Clare leapt from her seat. "I'm gonna go get K.C.," she said, and broke into a run.

From nearby, the roar of sirens could be heard.

**VI.**

"She's vomiting," one nurse informed.

"What are her vitals?"

"I got the charcoal."

"How's her airway?"

"She's breathing on her own."

"I can't get a line in!"

"Heart rate's 250."

"How much does she weigh?"

"Lungs are wet; she's in failure."

"We're gonna need the crash cart!"

"We're not shocking her; she's hemodynamically stable!"

"Get Dr. Cuyler in here!"

Jenna stood in the threshold of the trauma room. Everything seemed to be moving in slow-motion; the movements of the doctors, the way their mouths moved, even their voices seemed slowed. But through it all, the only certainty Jenna could make out was the ever-present howls of her daughter, tiny and squirming under the cool, clinical hands of the doctors, who bustled around her with needles and syringes and other nameless tools, touching and probing and invading her frail little body in brutal ways.

"Damn it, pulse-ox is down to 88!"

"She's retracting."

"Respiratory distress."

"She's in pulmonary edema; we need to intubate."

Beside her, K.C. was chalk-white; his whole body shook violently, and his eyes were dilated almost pure white, flashing clear panic.

"What's wrong with her?" he screamed. His anguished roar was filled with fury and horror. "What's wrong with her? Why won't you tell us anything?"

One of the doctors tore his eyes away from Jordan long enough to give the two parents a once-over. "Somebody get them out of here!" he bellowed.

Jordan's tortured cry tore the ending off of his words, and he immediately bent back over her, roaming his gloved hands over her bare body. "Somebody get Cuyler in here, NOW!"

"Honey," said a kind-hearted nurse with a perm and periwinkle scrubs, "come on. Both of you. Let's get you out of here."

K.C. twisted away, nearly striking her in the face. "What's wrong with my daughter?" he howled.

It was the most tormented and agonizing sound Jenna had ever heard from him. It didn't even sound human anymore, but more like a wild animal, primal in its unbearable pain.

The nurse looked from each of their wild-eyed expressions.

"We need to get you both out of here," the nurse repeated, soft but firm. "You're not allowed to be in here."

"What's wrong with her?" whispered Jenna. Unlike K.C., she felt her entire voice had been stolen away; she could barely force her mouth to ground out the syllables. Her entire body felt frozen; it was like she was in some kind of nightmare, being chased by something terrible, and her legs had suddenly turned into jelly. "Will she be alright?"

The nurse hesitated, pushing them both out of the trauma room. "In here," she said, guiding them both towards a quiet corner of the hospital.

"Your daughter," she began, "was brought in with very severe symptoms. Tachypnoea, which is the rapid breathing; she has an irregular heart rhythm, and her body's temperature is elevated so high that it's jeopardizing her internal organs."

She paused, weighing her words as she let them sink down on Jenna and K.C., like stones pressing down on their hearts. "This kind of poisoning can cause complete cardiovascular collapse and death in children under one," she added softly.

Jenna stared at her. "Poison?"

The nurse nodded soberly. "Amphetamine overdose," she clarified. "Ecstasy."


	5. Chapter 5

**I.**

"Her lungs were full of fluid. She was in severe respiratory distress. We had to intubate her to get her breathing again, but she's stable." The nurse glanced up at them. "For now."

Like a punch to the stomach, Jenna felt all the air suddenly rush out of her. Her chest seized up, and her hands flew to her neck, clawing at her throat. She wondered, briefly, if this was what having a heart attack felt like.

"Heart rate's down to 100, which is looking better for her. They're going to keep her in the pediactric I.C.U. overnight, and they'll probably remove the breathing tube in the morning, depending on whether or not she can get through the next few hours alright."

She nodded mechanically, unable to speak. She couldn't tear her eyes away from the figure in the bed.

Her daughter.

Tiny, unconscious, absolutely still. Pale as the white hospital sheet, as if she would disappear into the creased lines of the bedding if Jenna tore her eyes away for a moment.

A tube down her throat, because she couldn't breathe on her own. Various other tubes and wires going out of her. Brutal interventions on her daughter's little body, all necessary to keep her alive. A monitor on her bedside, keeping track of her baby's heartbeat.

_(Ironic, how something that went from the highest peaks to the lowest valleys was meant to be reassuring)_

If she didn't know any better, she would have thought that Jordan was already dead.

A jolt rushed through her like an electric shock. She let out an involuntary sound, something that didn't sound completely human. Kyle's arms wrapped around her, locking her tightly against his chest.

Beside her, Lisa was brisk and purposeful. Her hands on her hips, her grey eyes sharp and alight. Her whole body had a current that crackled and shot from every limb.

"So what does that mean for her?" she demanded. "Is she going to be ok?"

"Her vitals are stable," the nurse explained, "but she still has a long way to go."

Lisa nodded. She bit her lip, and for a moment, Jenna could see the thunderclouds pass in her eyes, pregnant and ominous with the threat of spilling over their salty and damning storm of tears.

"So, she's not entirely out of the woods yet," Kyle said from behind her. He was gazing at Jordan, but his arms tightened around Jenna. She could feel him shaking.

The nurse hesitated for a moment. "She could have long-term brain damage. Learning disabilities, low I.Q., memory impairment; it's too soon to tell."

K.C. stood behind Lisa, a grey-faced shadow.

"Could she still die?" he whispered.

"It's still too early to say" she repeated patiently. "Once she's stable enough to be extubated, we'll be able to know more."

With that, she left the four of them standing there beside Jordan's cradle.

Funny, how for people like her, this was just another day. They had become stock-piled, sorted through into analogous files- this was shell-shocked members of the wounded populace. They were _those_ sort of people, whom bad things happened to for no reason.

Lisa blew out a frustrated breath. "I wish there was more she could tell us," she muttered.

Kyle shifted his feet. "I wish we knew what actually happened," he replied.

He turned to Jenna, but his eyes were on K.C. "So you don't remember anything? Anything unusual, anybody around her that looked out of place, anyone doing anything that raised a red flag…"

"No," Jenna replied. "We've been over this. Nothing happened, Kyle."

He rolled his eyes. "Well, obviously, something did, Jenna, or we wouldn't be here right now. Something happened; you just didn't see it."

Her head snapped up in shock. His eyes were locked beyond her, drilling holes into K.C.'s face.

It didn't escape him, either.

"What's that supposed to mean?" K.C. said testily.

Kyle didn't bat an eyelash. "I think you know exactly what it means."

Lisa stepped between him and her son. "You can't be blaming K.C. for this," she said angrily.

"Well, somebody needs to give me an answer. Babies don't just end up in the hospital with a drug overdose on their own accord, now, do they?"

"Kyle." Jenna's jaw dropped.

K.C. flushed purple. "Shut up."

Lisa shook her head. "This is unbelievable," she muttered. "You can't be blaming my son."

"Well why the hell not?" he shouted, startling Jenna. "My niece is in the hospital, all hooked up to these tubes and wires, she almost fucking _died_, and nobody will tell me _why_!"

"That doesn't mean you get to blame K.C.!" Lisa argued.

Kyle's face burned crimson. "Why shouldn't I? As long as I've known him, he's never done anything right!"

It happened so fast that Jenna didn't have time to react; K.C. lunged past his mother, shoving Kyle hard in the chest. Her brother was much taller and stocky than K.C., but he stumbled back in surprise.

"Shut UP!" K.C. yelled. "Shut UP! YOU DON'T KNOW ANYTHING!"

He shoved Kyle again in the chest. Lisa leapt in between the two of them, her shouts exploding like fireworks as she tried to pry the two of them away.

Out of nowhere, people appeared, rushing around the three of them like a swarm of bees. Hands reached out and captured them, forcibly tearing them apart.

"This is a hospital!" one nurse was yelling. "Any more of this and I'll have all of you thrown out and arrested!"

They unhanded K.C., still glaring daggers at Kyle. Jerking away from the orderlies holding him, he darted off down the corridor, refusing to listen to his mother's insistent calls to come back, and soon disappeared out of sight.

Jenna felt a sob choking in the back of her throat. She wanted to cry out to K.C., to chase after him and beg him to come back. She wanted to hold him.

She wanted him to hold her, stroke her hair, kiss her tears away and whisper in her hair that he loved her, she loved him, and everything was going to be alright.

She found, though, that she couldn't move- she couldn't even breathe.

Clutching the edge of the bed, she let her knees give out underneath her, sliding to the ground. A whimper as feeble as a newborn's first cry broke free between the slats of her fingers covering her artless, traitorous mouth. She tried in vain to clamp down harder, hiding the noise, but it did nothing to muffle the keening sounds that were now prying themselves loose from her throat, raw and inhuman in their pain.

A pair of slender arms wrapped themselves around her, and Jenna felt breath in her ear. For a moment, she thought it might be K.C., coming back to her, but instead, the arms tugged her against a female's chest.

Lisa wrapped her arms around her as she rocked her on the floor, murmuring shushed comforts into her hair. Jenna fell against her shoulder, and like a wave breaking against the jetty, let herself come apart.

**II.**

K.C. just barely made it out the front double doors of the ER before buckling. Staggering against the wall, unable to keep his legs underneath him any longer, he slunk his way to a bench, which he dropped into like a puppet cut loose from the strings.

It was freezing outside, and fresh snow was beginning to fall to the ground, dusting his hair and eyelashes, but he barely noticed the chill in his thin clothes. Every inch of him was shaking; he jackknifed into himself, his spinning head resting on his kneecaps. His chest heaved mightily, the cold air burning his chest and cutting his throat as he tried to breathe.

It was like being drunk; lights were louder, colors were brighter, sounds were harder. The voices around him swam, indistinguishable, a speech bubble bursting unheard underwater. Time seemed to be moving in paradox, blurring past her like a car on a highway, while simultaneously slowing to an agonizing crawl.

_Oh, God._

How could he. How _could_ he. He knew that things had been strained with Kyle for months, but he couldn't _believe_ he would think he had anything to do with this…Jordan was lying in there, looking so weak and helpless…doctor's words…"not entirely out of the woods", long-term brain damage, learning disability, memory problems…she could still DIE…she was just a baby, so tiny…all those tubes and wires…she wasn't breathing…he always blamed him for everything, K.C. thought savagely. Everything was his fault, all the time. The guy could never believe for a second that K.C. had changed. Acting like K.C. never did anything for the baby, like he didn't care at all about her…fucking Kyle...keeping him away from Jenna like this…they needed to be together, Jordan was _their_ daughter, she needed her parents.

_Then where were you when this could have been stopped? Why didn't you save her?_

The words cut straight to his heart, bleeding out their truth with an ache almost too unbearable to breathe through. He gasped and shuddered as it seemed to pour from every part of his body; a hemorrhage of painful admonition.

_You failed her. _

_You fail everybody._

_You're such a fuck-up idiot. You ruin everything._

_You didn't want her, and this is what you get for it. _

_You were not there when your daughter needed you._

**III.**

"Jenna."

She glanced up at her brother from her shelter, the refuge of Lisa's arms. After forcing her into a chair beside the baby's bed, Kyle had wrapped his enormous hunting jacket around her, drawfing her in fleece and camo. She kicked off her heels and curled herself into the chair, into Lisa's embrace. Her bare toes were numb in the freezing hospital. She didn't care. She could barely take her eyes off of Jordan, despite the fact she could barely keep them open.

Kyle peered down at her, looking as exhausted as she knew she must. His eyes were bloodshot, his skin the color of cold oatmeal. He was wearing only a t-shirt and jeans, his feet stuffed into untied boots; he'd rushed to the ER at Lisa's frantic phone call without tying them, and without his wallet.

"The doctors said that your friends are here," he told her. "Alli, and Clare, and some guy. They're asking about Jordan. They want to see you."

Jenna blinked. She stared at him, uncomprehending, before shifting her eyes back to Jordan.

"I can't," was all she could manage.

Lisa's arms tightened around her. "Why don't I go talk to them," she offered. "You two can take over from here."

Kyle nodded. Lisa kissed Jenna on the forehead before hauling herself to her feet with an exhausted sigh. She ran a hand tiredly through her hair, heading out to the waiting room to tell her well-meaning friends God only knew what. Kyle took the seat she had just vacated, his arms closing around Jenna and rocking her slightly.

Jenna struggled to keep her eyes open. "She looks like she's sleeping," she sighed, gazing at Jordan's still form.

"You want me to take over for awhile?" he whispered.

She shook her head. "No."

One hand reached up, stroking her tangled hair, expertly curled and styled by Alli only hours before. The dance now seemed like a million years ago; her friends a distant memory, part of a different reality. Seeing them would make everything seem unreal, as opposed to more. They didn't belong in this moment, in this part of her life. Try as she might, Jenna couldn't make the two halves of tonight come together to form the picture, reconciling what it was with what it had become.

Kyle rested his chin on the pale horizon of her head.

"She's going to pull out of this, Jen," he whispered fiercely.

Jenna's chin trembled; she could feel more tears welling up, stinging her already-exhausted, swollen eyes.

"She might not," she choked out. "She might never wake up again."

Kyle twitched, pulling away from her slightly. "Jenna…"

The dam burst; she folded over herself into his arms, burying herself into his shirt as if she was trying to crawl under his skin and hide from the horror of all of this.

He squeezed her so tightly it left her breathless. "It'll be okay."

She heard the plea in his voice, reduced to the desperation of begging. He didn't believe it any more than she did.

"You don't know that," she replied

"No," was his only response; not an answer at all.

**IV.**

"Thought I'd find you here."

He forced himself to look up. His mother was standing in the hospital doorway. She came over and sat beside him.

"A few of your friends came over to see you guys," she told him. "Asked about the baby. Don't worry; I sent them away. Told them you and Jenna weren't ready to see anybody yet."

He managed a stiff nod. "Thanks."

She rested a hand on his knee, giving it a squeeze.

"Look at that moon," she said lightly, staring up at the sky.

K.C. followed her eyes. It was an absolutely clear night, the pitch-black sky still and glimmering idly with uncapped stars. The full pearl of the moon had a staunch, wan glow, shining down on the city frozen solid, and making the icy streets and trees look as fragile as glass.

"She needs you, you know."

She turned to look at him. He stared at the ground.

"Did you hear what he said to me?"

"I heard," she said simply. "That doesn't change anything."

"You heard what he said."

"And you're still her father," she reminded him.

He glared at her. "You think I had something to do with this," he said accusingly.

She rolled her eyes. "This isn't about you!" she snapped.

She got to her feet and looked down at him, her face heavy and disappointed.

"K.C."

He forced himself to look at her.

"Look," she told him. "Jordan needs both of her parents right now, okay? You're Dada; she's the Mama. You guys are the strongest people in that girl's life. You need to be there for her."

He looked away; he couldn't stand being looked at with that hard, blazing look.

He stared back up at the sky.

It was a cruel moon on a silent night. It made K.C. want to throw something into the blackness, to stand up and cry at the freezing air, to scream and rage and howl at that full, mocking moon, until the peaceful night cracked under the weight of the fury pressing his heart and shattered around them, leaving shards of black, bottomless sorrow everywhere they touched.

"I'm scared, Mom," he whispered.

She wrapped her arms around him. "Oh, baby, I know. Me too. But she needs you right now. That's what you have to do as a parent; be there for your kids, no matter how scared you are."

**V.**

He stumbled into the dimly lit room, the monitors by Jordan's bed humming like a low current. He took a step closer to her, but then chickened out when he saw all the tubes and wires hooked up to her bird-like body; he couldn't stand to look at her like that.

Jenna was curled in a seat beside the baby, covered in Kyle's jacket and resting her head on a pillow made from his mother's scarf. He stooped down, gently kissing her forehead, and took off his own thin vest, draping it around her.

She stirred and opened her eyes, staring at him with a heavy-lidded, mascara-stained gaze. "The baby," she murmured, rustling under her nest of jackets.

He put an arm around her. "Shhh," he whispered. "She's here."

She looked over in the bed, as if for reassurance, and her face clouded over when she realized that, in spite of her best efforts to deny it, this hadn't been some horrible dream.

"You want something more comfortable?" he offered.

She glanced up at him, confused.

K.C. lifted her into his arms and settled into her seat, resting her on his lap. Jenna's head fell to his shoulder, her breath warm and stale against his collarbone, her hands intertwined with his as her ear pressed against the warm metronome of his heart.

"Look at what we did," Jenna whispered to him. "Look at her. Look at what we did to her."

"We didn't do this, J," he reminded her. "It was an accident."

"It doesn't make it any better," she said. Her voice caught, and she hiccupped against his neck, burying her face in his shoulder as her arms wound tighter around his neck. K.C. gripped her more tightly, hands winding in her hair, placing a kiss on her forehead.

"She's going to come out of it," he murmured into her hair. He kissed her again- on her forehead, on her eyelids, between her eyes, on the top of her nose, and finally on her trembling lips. "She'll wake up."

Jenna only shuddered harder in his arms. Her chest tightened, and her breathing was shallow and rapid, like she was strangling on her tears and her grief.

"I don't understand," she sobbed, "why this is happening to us."


	6. Chapter 6

**I.**

A little after 2 AM, Jordan had a seizure. Her limbs stiffened and her whole tiny body began to buck and heave, like a wild bull at a county rodeo.

In a flash, nurses were everywhere, one of whom led Jenna and K.C. forcibly from the room and into the hallway.

"Your daughter's body temperature is too high," she explained gently. "It's causing her major organs to start shutting down. The seizures are her body's way of giving out."

Jenna felt her knees give out from underneath her; everything swam around her. Blindly, she groped the air in front of her, struggling to find something to grab on to. Her hand reached the handicap railing along the wall, and she clung to it desperately, like the wreckage of a quickly sinking ship.

Beside her, K.C. put his hands on his hips. Turning abruptly on his heels, he began to march away from her. He made it about ten paces way before he stopped, bent over a trash can, and hurled so violently that his knees hit the floor.

Jordan's body was failing. It was only a matter of time to tell whether or not she would be able to keep fighting, or if she would simply give up.

**II.**

Lisa sat beside K.C. in the patient lounge, shaking so badly that she felt like she might spill her cup of coffee all over her lap. Her son clutched her hand, digging half-moons into her own hand as he held tightly.

On her other side, Kyle reached over, gently took the cup from her hands, and placed it on the table at his side.

Lisa glanced up at him. "Thank you," she murmured.

He shrugged. "No problem."

Lisa stared off down the hallway. They hadn't been allowed back into the room after Jordan had had her seizure, and nobody had told them anything since. A kind, grandmotherly-looking nurse with grey curls and periwinkle scrubs decorated with teddy bears holding balloons, had taken Jenna aside to talk, and she'd followed, too numb with shock to argue.

Kyle slumped farther down in his seat, his hands resting on his knees.

"Did you eat anything?" he asked.

It took a minute for her to realize he was talking to her.

"Oh," Lisa replied. "No. I didn't."

"You want something?"

"It's alright. I'm not hungry."

Kyle nodded, sinking back into his chair. His feet tapped Morse code into the linoleum floor, his head tilted towards the speckled ceiling.

"Wonder where Jenna is," he mumbled.

Lisa shrugged. "She's probably just getting some air."

"Still," Kyle muttered. "She'd want to know how Jordan was doing."

"Well, I'm sure if anything had changed, then she would be the first to know."

"Or they just won't tell us anything," he argued.

Lisa opened her mouth, then shut it again and looked away.

Beside her, her son stood up suddenly.

"Where you going, honey?" she asked.

"Bathroom," he mumbled under his breath, and headed down the dimly lit hallway before she could say anything else.

Lisa turned to Kyle and fixed a stern expression at him. She figured it was best to say something now, while he and Jenna were both out of earshot.

"Look, Kyle," she began. "I know you and I aren't exactly friends, but the point is, we're family. They need us both to get along and help them. And we're not helping anybody by being petty. So, please, just try, okay? For the kids. So whatever _this_ is that you've got going on with me, it stops. Now." She raised her eyebrows at him. "Got it?"

Kyle looked at her in disbelief.

"You think you can talk to me like that?" he asked.

"I'll talk to anyone who disrespects me like you are. It's not the time, or the place."

Kyle glared at her. "You know what, Lisa? I really don't need this right now."

"Then stop trying to pick fights! Hate me all you want when this is over. Right now, suck it up and deal with the fact that they need us."

He snorted. "That's awfully self-righteous, coming from an ex-cokehead convict, don't you think?

Her jaw dropped. "And that makes you my judge?"

"It makes you not exactly in a position to take the moral high ground," he bit back.

Lisa jumped to her feet. "Fuck you, Kyle."

"No, fuck you, Lisa," Kyle shouted. He stood up, dwarfing her with his tall, broad frame. "Where do you think those drugs came from in the first place?"

Lisa felt the wind momentarily knocked out of her. She took a step back, staring at him in disbelief.

"You think I did this?"

Kyle rolled his eyes. "It's not like any of us have drug charges on our records, now, do we?"

She slapped him before she could stop herself, and before either one of them had the chance to react.

As if she were the one who had been slapped, Lisa's face stung. She withdrew her hand, shaking, and grabbed her purse and jacket off her vacated seat. Before Kyle could say anything, she headed straight for the door, stepping into the freezing night.

**III.**

K.C. climbed onto the elevator and pressed the button for the fifth floor, not caring what it was or where it led. He got off as soon as the creaky elevator doors bumped opened, pushing past the hassled-looking nurses and irate doctors without looking back. He finally found a men's room at the very end of the ward, near a giant floor-to-ceiling window that offered a spectacular view of the glowing city. He paused a moment, staring at the Toronto skyline , before ducking into the blessedly deserted bathroom.

He braced himself against the sink and stared at his reflection, trying to catch his breath. His chest felt tight and heavy, as if someone were sitting on top of him, and he couldn't seem to breathe normally. He forced himself to inhale deeply, then hold his breath, and let it out as slowly as he possibly could. Briefly, he was reminded of the pre-natal classes he'd attended with Jenna, and the breathing exercises they'd learned for labor.

_Breathe, two, three, four…in, two, three, four…out…in, two, three…_

_Crash.  
_

With a guttural moan, K.C grabbed the silver waste bin in the corner of the bathroom, and hurled it headlong into the mirror. The glass shattered, falling around him in razor-sharp chunks, and the trash can clattered to the floor with a deafening clang.

**IV.**

Jenna remembered very clearly the day Jordan was born. She had given birth at the dawn of the warmest spring day Toronto had seen in nearly a century. It was almost apocalyptic, one newscaster had announced, how wildly the temperature had fluctuated- overnight, it had gone from cold enough to bring on an entire new wave of dismaying snow storms to the sun-starved city, to all of a sudden blooming into a balmy, humid day.

Like a flower poking through the sidewalk crack; proof that beauty could sneak up and surprise you.

**V.**

"Lisa Guthrie?"

She was sitting on her bottom on the frigid sidewalk, smoking a cigarette. Her butt had gone numb a while ago, as had her fingers, but she didn't care; the cold gave her something to distract her mind.

"Yeah?"

A woman in a rumpled suit, smelling of bad hospital coffee, approached her. "I'm Trisha McGowan. I'm from the Department of Children & Families. Is there some place we can talk inside?"

Lisa blinked. The lack of sleep, the weak coffee, and cold had numbed her senses.

"You're a social worker?" she asked.

The woman nodded. "I'm here to ask you a few questions. Will you come inside, please?"

**VI.**

When K.C. came back to the patient lounge, he found his mother gone and Kyle asleep, his head leaning back against the wall. Jenna was still nowhere to be found, but there was a mother with a son who looked about four or five, wrapped up in a _Cars_ blanket and enormous man's sweatshirt, asleep in her lap as she rocked him absentmindedly, looking seconds away from falling asleep herself. Beside the mother was a middle-aged man dressed in an overcoat and house slippers, and beside him, a gangly, brace-faced girl in a _Camp Rock_ t-shirt.

The cougher suddenly lumbered to his feet. He bent down and whispered something to the girl beside him, who nodded in apparent agreement, and the man headed for the soda machine in the corner of the tiny room.

"Jenna come back yet?"

K.C. startled as Kyle stirred, sitting up and running a hand through his hair.

"No," he replied. "I don't know where she is."

Kyle glanced at his watch. "She's been gone a long time," he murmured.

K.C. made a noncommittal gesture. He hadn't forgotten what Kyle accused him of. Or the fact that Kyle just didn't like him in general.

"Excuse me?"

K.C. glanced up.

The man in the housecoat gestured vaguely towards the seat behind K.C.

"Mind if I sit?"

"Oh," K.C. said after a moment. "Yeah. Sure."

The man shuffled past him tiredly, taking a seat next to the girl and handing her a Diet Sprite. K.C. scooted over on the other side of Kyle, leaning against the wall.

"You should sit," Kyle whispered. "You look dead on your feet."

He shrugged. "Whatever. I'm fine."

"No, seriously," Kyle said, hauling himself up. He stretched backwards, cracking his jaw, and rubbed his tired eyes. "Sit, man. Sit down, before you fall down."

K.C. stared at him. "I'm fine," he repeated testily.

Kyle's face sagged tiredly. "Alright," he muttered, slouching back down into his seat. "If you say so."

**VII.**

When it came time for delivery, Jordan was in the right position, but instead of coming out headlong, the first thing to emerge into the world was her left arm.

The nurse present at her delivery, one who had assisted enough births to populate Jenna's Grade 10 class, had looked over at her from the moon of her heaving belly and laughed.

"One arm out, look at this little diva," the nurse joked.

She rubbed Jenna's arm, and then smirked at K.C., who looked seconds away from fainting face-first onto the delivery room floor.

"Hope you two are ready for this one," she laughed. "She's _drama_."

**VIII.**

"Are you aware of how your granddaughter ended up in the hospital?" Trisha McGowan asked her.

Lisa watched her from across the table.

"I think we both know what this is about," she replied.

Trisha McGowan sat calmly across from her, arms folded in her lap.

"Mrs. Guthrie," she explained patiently,"When a child this young ends up in the hospital due to reasons like this, we take it very, very seriously. As we would with any other child, rap sheet or no."

"You're here because of my arrest record," Lisa answered bluntly. "Well, let me simplify this for you. I'm clean. I've been clean for almost two years. You can ask my social worker, you can ask my Narcotics Anonymous sponsor, you can talk to my employer- who, by the way, requires a weekly drug test- and if you really want to talk to somebody, talk to my son. He'll tell you I've been clean every second I've had him living with me. "

"If Jordan didn't get them from your household," the woman asked sardonically, "Then how do you think a ten-month-old managed to get a hold of two Ecstasy tablets?"

"I have no idea, but she didn't get them from me. And I'll prove it to you."

"I'm sure you will," replied Trisha.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Lisa snapped.

"What about your son?" Trisha continued, as if Lisa hadn't spoken. "Do you think he could have had anything to do with this?"

"Why," Lisa demanded. "Because he lived in a group home?"

Trisha McGowan's impassive face didn't flicker.

"You won't mind a drug test to clear your name?"

Lisa nodded. "Absolutely."

"Mrs. Guthrie…" The woman reached over the table and touched Lisa's hand gently. "I know this may feel like a personal attack. But we're only trying to make sense of this."

Lisa glanced up at her eyes, liquid brown and surprisingly compassionate, and wilted, her harsh words dying in her throat.

_How can you make sense of this, _she thought._ I can't make sense of this. Any of this._

**IX.**

When they had finally pulled the baby out of Jenna's body, the nurse had held her up high, and Jenna was reminded briefly, absurdly, of _The Lion King_; of holding newborn Simba above his new kingdom while the world trumpeted his arrival with exultation, as the cub hovered bewildered in the arms of his presenter, gazing down at the uproarious celebration of the birth of their future king.

Instead, this tiny, still-slightly grayish-blue, not-quite-human-looking figure was held above the island of her still-round stomach in the arms of a capable nurse, covered in stuff that Jenna would rather not have thought about, her eyes black slits and hair matted to her head. She squirmed in the nurse's hands for a moment, kicking awkwardly, as if she couldn't figure out why her mother's belly was no longer around her.

The same nurse who had joked with K.C. and Jenna through the entire labor smiled broadly at the two of them.

"Gorgeous little lady," she sing-songed, placing the baby- who was, thankfully, starting to pink up and look like something that actually resembled a human being- in Jenna's arms. "Daddy better get a gun, there," she added, winking at K.C.

Neither of them responded. As the baby started to wriggle in her hold, squawking like a baby bird as she beat against Jenna's arms, the two of them just bent down and stared at her in wonder, whispering her name over and over again, unable to tear their eyes away from her.

And when Jordan let out her first real cry- loud and throaty and full of confusion- Jenna couldn't exactly blame her. After all, who wouldn't cry if they were suddenly ejected out of everything they had ever known and thrown into a place that was too harsh, too loud, too bright, too much to take in all at once?

**X.**

"Are you the father of Jordan Middleton?"

A nurse's voice fell over them like a cold rain, waking both K.C. and Kyle from their exhausted stupors. Kyle had been sitting in the same chair ever since his aborted attempt to start conversation with K.C., who slunk against the wall, hair covering his eyes and arms crossed sullenly over his chest.

K.C. lifted his head, but the nurse was glancing at Kyle over the clipboard.

"No," Kyle said. He jerked his thumb at K.C. without looking at him.

The nurse's eyes shifted to K.C., and he saw in her look the same flash that he often got whenever people realized he was a parent- disbelief, disappointment, scorn, something he couldn't quite identify but thought maybe was a little bit of anger- before smoothing over into a professional poker face.

"Is the mother around?" the nurse asked. "I would like to talk to the both of you."

K.C. shrugged. "I don't know where she is."

The nurse nodded. "Well, the good news is, your daughter hasn't had another seizure. We managed to get her body temperature down, and her vitals are stabilizing more. Her heart's fine, brain activity's normal. She's still intubated, but if she doesn't have another seizure, in a few hours, we might be ready to get her breathing on her own again."

K.C. bobbed his head along to her words. His mind was too tired to accept them, even though it was the first good news he'd heard since this nightmare began.

Kyle cleared his throat. "So, is she going to be okay?" he asked.

The nurse pressed her lips together.

"It's still early," she said, "but Jordan's looking stronger."

**XI.**

Lisa made it back to the waiting area just as a nurse walked away from K.C..

"What happened?" she demanded, rounding on her son. "What did she say?"

"She said Jordan's gotten better," he said. "She hasn't had another seizure. Everything looks good. Her heart's fine and everything."

Lisa's eyes widened. "Her heart?" she repeated weakly. "They were worried about her heart?"

"Mom," he said, "they said she was getting better."

Lisa grabbed the edge of the seat beside her, sinking down into the chair with a deep breath.

"Good," she whispered, more to herself. "Good."

She glanced around. "Where's Jenna?" she asked.

K.C. shrugged. "I thought she was with you," he said. "Where were you, anyway?"

Not wanting to explain that just yet, she replied, "Someone should find her. Tell her the news."

"What news?"

As if they had conjured her, Jenna materialized at their side. Her eyes were rimmed with dark circles, sunk into her face, and her hair was lank around her shoulders. She looked like a refugee in heels.

"What news?" she repeated blankly.

Lisa smiled tiredly at her. "The nurse just came out. Said Jordan was getting better."

Jenna's face didn't change. "Can we see her?"

**XII.**

Jordan was still unconscious, still hooked up and intubated, but Jenna didn't hesitate to go to her side. Swooping down by her bedside, she kissed her daughter's forehead, brushing the blonde hair out of her eyes.

Behind her, K.C. placed his hand on top of Jordan's head, his fingers brushing her cheek. He'd been too scared to touch her before, with all the tubes and wires and machines hooked up to his daughter's body, but he stroked her cheek gently and ruffled her curls with his fingers.

Jenna knelt down and brushed her lips against Jordan's ear.

"Mommy would do this for you," she breathed. "If I could, Mommy would do it all for you."

Her throat, filled with tears and her heart pressing down like a stone, closed up, and for a moment, she couldn't breathe.

"But I can't," she choked out. "Mommy can't."


	7. Chapter 7

**I.**

"Stats are up, heart rate's in the normal range, body temp is almost where it should be," the nurse told them, as she read off the charts of Jordan's latest examination. "Miss Jordan here is looking better every minute."

Slumped exhaustedly in K.C.'s arms, Jenna could barely bring herself to nod.

"That's great," she said weakly.

K.C. squeezed her more tightly to him.

"So does this mean," he asked hesitantly, "she's gonna be okay?"

The nurse glanced down at Jordan. "Well, we'll have to run a few more tests, but so far, brain scan's normal, heart's still good, and she's making urine. All good signs. We'll have to make sure she doesn't have another seizure, but if things still keep improving like they have been, then we might be able to extubate her soon."

Jenna could feel K.C. heave a sigh of relief. He leaned into her, his arms hooking around her stomach and his chin balancing on the shelf of her shoulder. He let out a sigh into Jenna's tangled hair and buried his face into her neck, breathing deeply. He collapsed into her, as if he were trying to melt into her body.

Jenna put her hands over his, and absentmindedly began rocking on her heels from side to side. She absorbed his profound relief and exhaustion into her own bones, running through her like marrow. Her hands stroked his, intertwining their fingers, and she continued to sway and hold, comforting him as if he were Jordan, waking up from a bad dream- knowing she was safe, that nothing more could hurt her, as long as Jenna kept holding her.

**II.**

"I'm sorry."

Lisa opened her eyes and saw Kyle, shuffling awkwardly in place, his skin flushing so red it made his freckles expand.

"What I said…"

Lisa closed her eyes again.

"Kyle," she muttered. "Let's not do this now. Please."

"I just..." he stammered, "I- I want you to know, I didn't mean it."

"It's okay," she replied tiredly. "Really. Just…let's forget about it, okay? You didn't mean it, I didn't mean it, it's over, the end."

Kyle nodded stiffly.

"You were right," he said. "The drama between us stops now."

**III.**

"I have to tell you guys," the doctor warned. "Extubations are hit or miss with kids this little. "

A visible tremor ran through Lisa's body. "What do you mean?"

"It means that they have a harder time coming off the vent than older children," he explained. "But if we don't think she's responding, then we'll put her right back on."

"You sound like you're using her as a guinea pig," Kyle asked accusatorily.

Jenna ran her fingers through Jordan's hair.

"What happens if she doesn't?" she murmured. "Respond."

The doctor shrugged. "We won't know how she'll respond until we try," he said.

"But what if she doesn't?" K.C. parroted.

"We re-intubate and monitor her lungs until we think they're strong enough to work on their own," he said.

The doctor listened to the whoosh of Jordan's heartbeat in his ears, then glanced around at everyone surrounding the bed.

"So…" he said, "Are we ready?"

Lisa put her hands on her hips, biting her lip; Kyle crossed his arms over his chest.

K.C. squeezed Jenna's shoulder. Jenna looked back down at Jordan, running her fingers through her hair once more.

"Okay," she said finally. "Alright."

The doctor nodded.

She bent down to Jordan's head, whispering in her ear.

" It's alright," she whispered, trying to keep her voice from shaking. "Shhh, shhh, 's alright, good girl, Jordy. Good, good girl baby."

K.C. gripped her shoulder harder. His other hand snaked around Jenna and rested on the top of Jordan's head, his thumb brushing her forehead gently.

From across the bed, Jenna saw Lisa's arm link into Kyle's.

"And here we go," the doctor said.

"1, 2, 3."

"Tube," he called to one of the nurses standing by. "Suction."

"Alright," he murmured to the baby. "Come on Jordan. Come on, baby. Big cough. Big cough."

K.C. squeezed her in a vice-like grip.

"Come on" she could hear him muttering into her hear. "Come on, come on, come on."

"She's not breathing," Lisa cried out. Her voice was skirting the knife edge of hysteria. "Why isn't she breathing?"

"Just hold on," the doctor replied, not taking his eyes off Jordan.

"What's happening?" Kyle demanded. "What's happening to her?"

The doctor didn't answer. He made a motion at the nurse, who bent close as he whispered something into her ear.

Lisa struggled in Kyle's hold.

"What's happening?" she shouted.

Jenna's hands shook. She glanced up at K.C., whose face was chalk-white.

And suddenly, there was a cry.

Jordan squirmed; her eyes opened, and her legs began to thrash, fighting the hands of the nurse that were roaming over her body. Her back arched, and she let out another cry, more assured and clear this time, a bell-like sound of confusion and fear.

The doctor glanced around the bed, taking in the relief on their ashen faces.

"That's a happy sound," he murmured.


	8. Chapter 8

**I.**

Jenna woke up in darkness.

Confused, she sat bolt-up in bed, for a moment unsure if she was at home, or still in the hospital. Then she reached down and smoothed her hand over the sheets, and remembered where she was.

She glanced over at the empty space beside her, and wondered where K.C. and Jordan had gone. The last thing she remembered was lying on the bed, with the baby in between, them as soon as they'd gotten home from the hospital.

Her jaw dropped when she saw the L.E.D. letters blinking back at her. It was already five-thirty; when she and K.C. had gotten home, it was just after nine. Had they really been out that long?

Still groggy with sleep, she climbed out of bed and pushed open the door, walking into the family room. The TV was off, but Jenna swore she could hear music.

"Hello?"

"In here!" K.C. called.

The bathroom door was slightly ajar, light spilling out through the little space- as did the music Jenna had been hearing. When she pushed open the door, she found K.C. sitting on the lip of the tub, running the wash cloth over Jordan, who was playing with a bar of soap that made the water look liquid marble. K.C. had his iPod plugged into the dock resting on top of the sink, bobbing his head and singing along under his breath.

When he saw Jenna standing in the doorway, he smiled at her.

"Good morning, sleepyhead," he teased. "Or, really, good night."

She brushed her hair tiredly out of her eyes. "I can't believe I slept all day."

"You looked like you needed it," he said.

Jenna nodded. "Yeah," she said. "I'm still so tired, though."

"So go back to sleep."

She glanced down at Jordan. "Has she eaten something yet?"

K.C. shook his head. "I tried giving her a bottle, but she didn't drink anything."

She frowned. "She hasn't eaten since Saturday night."

He shrugged. "Well, she'll eat when she's ready, I guess. She's alright, Jen. Go back to sleep if you're tired." He grinned down at Jordan, still absorbed in playing with the slippery bar of Irish Spring. "Big Daddy's got bath time down, doesn't he?"

Jenna nodded, but made no motion to leave. Instead, she sat on the lip of the tub next to Jordan, putting her toes in the lukewarm water.

"Somebody needed a bath," K.C. teased Jordan in a sing-song voice, rubbing the no-tangle shampoo in her hair. "You smelled like hospital."

Jenna tried to smile at him. "Did your mom go to work?"

He nodded. "She made some macaroni before she left. It's in the fridge, if you're hungry."

"Not really. Did she say anything before she left?"

"No, not really." He looked over at her. "Why?"

Jenna shrugged. "I don't know. Just wondering. Have you slept at all?"

"A little," he said. "Then I woke up and couldn't go back to sleep."

"You can take a nap if you want. I can finish giving her a bath."

"No, it's alright. I'm up. I'll probably just fall asleep really early tonight."

He paused, squeezing the wash cloth in mid-air, then turned to Jenna. He looked like he was on the verge of saying something he really did not want to say, chewing on his lower lip nervously.

"What?" she asked.

He hesitated a moment. "Social Services called. They left a message. They want to meet with us sometime soon."

"For what?"

He busied himself rinsing the soap off of Jordan's back and shoulders. "They talked to my mom."

"Who talked to her?" she asked, still confused. "Social services?"

"Yeah."

"What did they want?"

K.C. couldn't quite look at her. He continued washing the baby, then ran his fingers through Jordan's wet hair, making it stick up at crazy angles.

"A social worker talked to my mom at the hospital Saturday night. I didn't know about it until this afternoon, when I heard the message. She didn't tell me exactly what happened, but she said that the hospital has to report whenever stuff like this happens."

"When stuff like what happens?"

K.C. sighed. "Babies ending up in the ER because of drug overdoses, Jenna. Don't you think, given my mom's record and the fact that I almost ended up in juvie, they would be a little bit suspicious?"

Jenna reeled back as if she'd been slapped. Her head was spinning.

"But, they don't actually believe…" she said dazedly, unable to complete the thought.

Just like that, she remembered the conversation she and K.C. had had, the night he'd told her about being abused by his mother's dealer.

The Lisa that she knew and loved-as a mother, grandmother, and support system-had once been someone entirely different. The same woman who took care of her baby had once allowed such horrible, traumatizing experiences to happen to her own child.

But she'd changed. Lisa had gotten out of prison. She'd kicked her drug habit, and hadn't relapsed. She was better now.

Was she?

Jenna's head throbbed. She bent over, resting her elbows on her knees, and balanced her head in her hands.

"Do you believe it?" she whispered, not really wanting to know the answer.

K.C. bit his lip. "My mom's clean, Jenna."

"But do you believe it?" she demanded.

He shook his head, as if trying to shake the answer loose.

"Yeah," he said finally. "I do."

"So you don't think," Jenna replied slowly, "that your mom had anything to do with the drugs? Or how Jordan swallowed them?"

"I don't." He gave her a suspicious look. "Do you?"

She wanted to say yes, but still in her mind was the way K.C. hadn't been able to look at her; how tightly he had squeezed her hand, and the tears in his eyes when he'd told her about being molested. He hadn't been able to touch the baby after saying that, so Jenna had had to rock Jordan back to sleep later that night when she'd woken up crying. It was as if he had been afraid that he could somehow pass the awful memory of what had happened down to his daughter; as if, my osmosis, she would somehow absorb the horror, guilt, and shame K.C. had felt, the helplessness and terror, at being hurt in such a nightmarish way.

"I…" Jenna said shakily, "I don't know."

She glanced down at Jordan, who squawked in protest as K.C. rinsed her hair with a cup of water, and suddenly, she was crying so hard, she couldn't catch her breath.

K.C. put his wet arms around her.

"Hey," he whispered. "Hey. You know my mom. You _know_ she didn't do it. If I can believe it, you can."

Jenna only cried harder, sobbing into his shoulder.

"It's not that," she wailed.

"What is it?"he asked, confused.

Her eyes went back to Jordan, now watching both of her parents with interest. Jenna wiped her eyes on the back of her hand, and sniffled loudly, trying to compose herself.

K.C. reached over and brushed the tear tracks on her cheek away with one pruned, suds-covered hand. He cupped her chin for a moment, his faces inches from his own, then pulled her in gently for a kiss, resting his lips on her forehead.

"Jenna," he whispered. "She's fine."

He gestured towards Jordan, staring at them with wide eyes. "See? Look at her. She's here, she's alright. She's safe. Everything is _fine."_

Jenna looked back down at Jordan, splashing water with her tiny fists. She grinned back at her mother, reaching one hand up to her, and Jenna burst into tears again.

"Don't you want to know how this happened?" she sobbed. "She almost _died_, K.C.. She almost died, and we don't know how it happened, and now they think we did this to her!"

"But we didn't," he rushed, putting his hands on her shoulders. "We didn't do this, Jenna."

"Then who did?" she cried.

K.C. glanced at her, than at Jordan, who was trying to stand up against the lip of the tub. He bent down and picked her up, water sluicing over the both of them as he rested her on his lap.

Wordlessly, Jenna grabbed the towel resting on the sink and handed it to K.C., who wrapped Jordan up and carried her out of the bathroom.

He glanced at Jenna over his shoulder.

"Help me put her to bed?" he asked.

After a moment, she followed him.

**II.**

"Did we do this to her?" she whispered.

She glanced at Jordan, asleep in her crib in the corner.

K.C. spooned up behind her and pulled him into her arms, his hands hooking around her belly.

"We didn't do anything," he whispered. He nuzzled the back of her neck, then kissed the freckled skin of her shoulder blade.

Her hands tightened around his. "Then how does something like this happen?"

Behind her, she could feel K.C. sigh.

"Jen," he murmured. He kissed her shoulder again. "You have got to stop this crazy looping."

"How can you?" she demanded, turning over in bed to face him. "How can you just forget about this? This isn't the kind of thing you can forget about."

"Don't you think I know that?" he replied. "We spent the worst night of my life in the E.R. with her. Nobody knows how, or why, but we know it wasn't our fault. Can't you just move on?"

She snorted in disbelief. "No, K.C., I can't just 'move on'. This isn't the kind of thing you 'move on' from."

"So what are you going to do?" he challenged. "Torture yourself with it? How's that gonna change anything? Or help anyone?"

She rolled her eyes, turning back away from him in frustration.

"It's a hell of a lot better than just pretending it never happened," she muttered. "You're good at that enough for the both of us."

K.C. sat up suddenly.

"Excuse me?" he said, knowing exactly what she'd said.

She turned to face him. "You're the one who's the expert at avoidance. But I can't pretend this never happened, because it did, and she nearly died! How can anyone forget about that? You can't! You shouldn't!"

"Which one is it?" he challenged.

Jenna sat up.

"Why are you acting like this?" she said.

She forgot to whisper, and as soon as the words left her mouth there was a rustling in the crib next to them. They both held their breaths, waiting for a cry or for Jordan's head to pop up from over the bars, but instead they just heard her snort in her sleep, followed by the soft, low flow of her breathing as she continued to dream uninterrupted.

K.C. covered his eyes with his hands. "I don't want to talk about this anymore," he muttered.

"We have to!" Jenna replied. "This is something we can't avoid!"

"I said, I don't want to talk about it," he repeated.

Jenna could have smacked him. "Why not?" she snapped.

"Because I can't!" he said, his eyes blazing.

"Can't what?" Jenna asked.

K.C. didn't answer.

Jenna tried a different tactic. She reached over to take his hand, but when her fingers touched his, she was surprised to feel them trembling.

"Think about this," he mumbled.

He lay back down in the bed. Jenna lay down beside him, her hands closed over his. She could see tears in his eyes as he bit his lip, staring up at the ceiling.

"I can't think about this," he said slowly, "because whenever I do, it makes me want to _die_. That's how bad it hurts."

Jenna squeezed his hands tightly. "K.C…."

"She almost died, J," he whispered, and there was real horror in his voice.

His face was ashen as he choked back a sob. "She almost died, and I couldn't fucking do anything. I didn't stop it. I didn't know what to do. I wasn't there when she needed me. All I do is let everybody down. I fuck everything up. And I fucked up and almost killed her."

"No, no, K.C., you didn't…"

"I did," he choked out. "I fucked up. I let her down. I promised I'd never let her down, and look what happened."

"K.C.," she said, and like a string on a sweater, it was enough to unravel him completely. He rolled over to face her and fell into her arms, pressing against her as he shook with his own sobs. He cried hot, fast, tears, splashing her chest and shoulders with his own shame and terror.

Jenna wrapped her arms around him, pulling him close, and held him as they both cried in silence, listening to Jordan sleep peacefully barely five feet away.


	9. Chapter 9

**Author's Note: In this story, Bianca & Drew never dated. Just a head's up for later on in this chapter.**

**Probably should have put in the standard disclaimer before the final chapter, but I don't own Degrassi. Just Jordan.**

**I.**

"Jenna," Ms. Oh said in a clipped voice. "I trust you have a good reason for being ten minutes late to class?"

Jenna shook her head, slinking into her seat and trying to ignore the stares of her classmates.

Ms. Oh sighed. "Talk to me after class," she told Jenna, then turned back to the rest of the students. "Don't forget, your presentations on representations of bias in various forms of social media are next Tuesday, everybody. I'm giving you guys a class period to work on this, but if I get the feeling you're aren't taking advantage of it, we can always lecture instead."

Jenna sighed, wishing she had just skipped class altogether. She had only been out of school for two days, but now that she had come back, she felt as if she had missed an entire week's worth. She had to make up a Trig quiz for Armstrong, write an English paper due Friday, and catch up on all of the homework she'd missed for Perino's class.

Not to mention get started on this stupid Media Immersion project.

From across the barrier of their computers, Sadie caught her eye.

"Jenna," she whispered, glancing over her shoulder to make sure if Ms. Oh wasn't watching, "how's Jordan doing?"

Jenna made sure to weigh her words before she answered. She and K.C. had both agreed that they didn't want to tell everybody what actually happened Saturday night; there were already enough rumors, and if word got around about how Jordan had really ended up in the E.R., who knows what people would think.

"She's fine," Jenna answered. "Now."

Sadie's eyes were wide and concerned. "So she's doing better?"

"Yeah, she is. We took her to the doctor the other day for a check-up, and they said everything was normal."

Sadie smiled in relief. "That's great."

"Miss Rowland! Miss Middleton!" Ms. Oh called from her desk, making both girls jump, "do I need to give out detention slips?"

"No," they said together.

Ms. Oh gave them a pointed look. "Then I suggest you get working on your presentations."

Both girls nodded and went back to their screens, but not before Jenna shot Sadie another grateful look.

When class was over, Jenna approached Ms. Oh's desk.

"I'm sorry about today," she murmured. "It's been kind of crazy recently."

Ms. Oh's stern face didn't change. "I heard," she said.

"So," Jenna said, "umm…is that all? Cause I'm about to be late for English."

Ms. Oh sighed. She took her glasses off, resting them on her desk, and Jenna was surprised at how less intimidating she looked without them.

"I just wanted to tell you," she said quietly, "that I'm glad the baby's alright. It must have been very scary, having her in the hospital. I'm so sorry. I hope she's doing better."

Surprised, Jenna could only nod.

"Thanks. Um, yeah, she's getting better. The doctor said she's gonna be fine."

Ms. Oh nodded. "That's good."

The bell rang, startling the both of them. Ms. Oh slipped her glasses back on, and resumed her normal, stern expression.

"You should get to class," she said pointedly.

Jenna nodded again, gathering her things to leave.

"Jenna?" Ms. Oh called again.

She turned in the doorway and looked back.

Ms. Oh gave her a small smile. "I'm really glad she's okay."

**II.**

"K.C.!"

K.C. glanced over his shoulder and saw Drew coming over to him.

"Dude," he said, "I heard about the baby. Is she alright?"

K.C. nodded tiredly. "Yeah. Now."

"What happened?" Drew asked. "I heard she was freaking out or something. She screamed the place down, from what I heard."

K.C. hesitated a moment.

"They don't really know," he said. "It could have been anything. But I guess it was just one of those freak things, I guess."

"Still," Drew said soberly, "pretty scary."

"Yeah," K.C. mumbled, turning away and pretending to be occupied with rearranging his locker.

"Glad she's okay, man," Drew said, clapping him on the shoulder.

"Yeah," he repeated. "Me, too."

He slammed his locker shut, signaling a change in discussion was needed.

"So tell me, man," he said nonchalantly, "what'd I miss at the rest of the dance?"

Drew shrugged. "Nothing much. It was pretty lame. You know. Bad music, bad punch, bad decorations."

"Glad I didn't miss out," K.C. joked.

"Though," Drew added, "you _did_ miss a pretty great show in the parking lot after hours."

"What kind of show?"

Drew laughed. "Let's just say," he said, "that it involved Bianca, a leather mini skirt, and dancing on the hood of some guy's car."

"Dude," K.C. punched Drew on the shoulder, "Details. Spill. Now."

"Ahh," Drew sighed, "I'm not sure. You know, these things never sound as good when you describe them. I mean, you really needed to _be_ there to see what a masterpiece it was."

K.C. groaned. "Spare me, okay? Just tell me, dude. Seriously. I need some good news, after the weekend I had."

Drew smirked. "Alright. Well, apparently Bianca decided to make the most of the _full moon_," he emphasized dramatically, "if you know what I mean."

K.C.'s eyebrows shot up. "No way."

Drew nodded, looking like Christmas had come early. "Dude, it was truly a thing of beauty. You should have seen it. It was after the dance had ended, and a couple of us from the basketball team were hanging out in that alleyway behind The Dot. Anyway, Bianca's there with a couple of those ravine creeps, and she climbs up on top of this guy's hot rod in the middle of Gaines Street, dancing on the hood in these huge heels, and her dress- or," he laughed, "really, I guess, the lack of it, gave all of us a nice view."

K.C. snickered. "Oh, man. If there is a God, someone taped it and put it on Youtube."

The two of them both laughed, bumping knuckles.

"Yeah," Drew acknowledged as their laughter tapered off. "She was definitely out of it that night."

"She was wasted?" K.C. asked. He'd seen Bianca earlier that night, and she hadn't seemed drunk.

Drew shrugged. "Knowing her, probably on something."

**III.**

"Jordan," Jenna cried in exasperation, "I'll never be able to study if you don't stop talking."

Hanging onto the rim of her Pack-n-Play, Jordan continued to babble, an endless stream of bright, mismatched syllables.

Jenna sighed. She had a ton of make-up work to do, and Jordan wasn't making it any easier. Normally Lisa had the baby Thursday nights, but since she had missed work on Sunday after spending all day in the hospital, she'd picked up an extra shift tonight to make some extra money. Now Jenna was swamped with make-up work in addition to the stuff she already had to do, and she didn't have anybody to watch the baby while she got her work done.

In her playpen, Jordan let out another insistent shriek, and Jenna groaned.

"Alright," she called. "Alright. Chill. Hold on." She lifted Jordan out of the pen and bounced her in her arms. "You wanna come on the couch and cuddle with Mommy?"

Jordan squirmed away from Jenna, instead letting out another wail.

"What are you reaching for?" she muttered. "You need to let Mommy study."

Jordan twisted in her arms.

"You don't care, do you," Jenna sighed. She held Jordan above her head, so that her daughter's face was inches from her own. "You want Mommy to go to university? Huh? You want Mommy to go to school, and get a career, and send you to a nice school someday?"

She heard the front door swing open. "Anyone home?" K.C. called, dropping his backpack on the ground.

He walked over and kissed Jenna, then plucked Jordan from her arms. "Hey pretty baby."

"I'm glad you're home," she said. "Does Big Daddy want to take over babysitting duties for the night?" she asked. "Cause I have a ton of homework I need to catch up on."

"Where's my mom?"

"At work. She's picking up an extra shift to make up for this weekend."

K.C. frowned. "I was kind of counting on her to babysit tonight. I have a crapload of homework due."

Jenna rolled her eyes. "So do I, K.C.. And I'm already behind."

He shrugged. "Well, then, we'll just have to work hard." He plucked Jordan out of her arms and bounced her on his waist "We got this. Right, Jordy-Girl?"

**IV.**

"We really need to tell your Mom to go shopping," Jenna said. "Spagettios for two days straight isn't exactly a well-balanced meal."

"Hey," K.C. said, "I don't mind."

"That's because you only eat, like, five things altogether," Jenna reminded him. "As long as it's fried, greasy, or covered in cheese, you're happy."

"Spagettios aren't any of those things," he protested. "And that's a lie. I love chocolate, too."

Jenna made a face at him.

Beside them, Jordan sat in her high chair, tomato sauce and noodles smeared over her face and all over the tray of her high chair.

Jenna stood beside K.C. at the sink, watching him scrub the dinner plates clean.

"You know," she said conversationally, "It's nice having you home."

"Yeah?"

Jenna nodded.

"She's happier," she observed, glancing at Jordan. "Seeing us together."

K.C. grabbed the rag hanging on the fridge handle and began drying the plates. "Jordan's happier," he repeated, not looking at her.

"And I am, too," Jenna said. "I like this. Just us. Being here."

She turned back to her daughter. "Like a family," she added.

K.C. looked over at her. "We are a family, Jenna," he told her.

She shrugged. "Not really."

K.C. sighed. "Look," he said, "we love together, we sleep together, we raise our child together. If that's not a family…"

"Maybe you need to rethink your definition," she retorted.

K.C. gave her an aggravated look. "Please don't tell me where I think this is going," he groaned.

"I don't know," Jenna said coolly. "You tell me."

K.C. slammed the dishrag against the sink, sending water splashing everywhere like stray sparks from a fire.

"See?" he said. "There you go again. Never telling me what I did wrong. Tell me, Jenna, what did I do this time to piss you off?"

Jenna threw a glance at Jordan, who was observing them thoughtfully as she painted her face with Spagettios. "Nothing," she hissed.

He rolled his eyes. "Well, I obviously did something, because things were just fine a minute ago!"

"No, you didn't!" she insisted. "I'm just glad that for once, you're staying home with us, instead of going out."

He shook his head. "You seriously aren't still pissed that I missed our past two date nights," he accused.

Jenna crossed her arms over her chest. "No."

"Yes, you are," he argued. "You're still holding it over my head! Well, you know what? Get over it. Okay? I told you, it couldn't be helped!"

"Yeah, and I'm sure you tried real hard to help it," she snapped back.

"See," he exclaimed, rounding on her, "this is why I don't like coming home to you! All you do is bitch at me for everything I'm doing wrong!"

"How am I bitching?" Jenna demanded. "I'm just bringing up a point to you. You're the one who's getting all defensive!"

"You never talk to me anymore, except to tell me what I'm doing wrong!" K.C. shouted. "After everything we just went through, are you really still made at me? What the hell am I doing wrong?"

Before she could answer him, K.C. stormed past her and Jordan, grabbing his jacket off the coat rack and heading out the door.

"Where are you going?" she called after him.

He didn't look back. "Out," was his curt reply, only partially heard as he cut off his own answer with the slam of the door behind him.

**V.**

_Fuck_, he felt stupid.

He knew that yelling at Jenna- especially in front of Jordan- was the worst idea in the world. He just had no idea what the hell was wrong. All they did was argue lately, about the stupidest things. Jenna would get on his case for something, then he'd get mad at her, then she'd get mad back, and then things would get so tense neither of them could stand living under the same roof. Before Jordan ended up in the hospital, it seemed like every night would end up this same way.

He didn't think things would change completely after this weekend, but he had kind of hoped to put aside all their problems for awhile.

Stupid idea.

He knew Jenna was upset about something, but he had no idea what was wrong. Badgering him constantly wasn't the problem, but neither was attacking her. There was something wrong with the both of them, something they had avoided talking about, and it was driving a major rift between them.

K.C. tiptoed back into the apartment a few hours later, closing the door gently in case the baby was awake. When he turned around, he saw Jenna on the couch, her knees curled up to her chest, her eyes red-rimmed and swollen with tears, and he wanted to kick himself all over again for being such an ass.

He approached her slowly, his head hung low.

"Can we talk?"

**VI.**

She glanced over at him and glared. "What do you want?"

He shuffled towards her. "I'm sorry," he whispered, biting his lip. "I feel like such a douchebag."

Jenna rolled her eyes. "You think?"

He didn't say anything, but sat down on the couch next to her. When she didn't move away, he reached over and tentatively placed a hand on her knee.

"I'm so sorry," he repeated.

Jenna sniffled. "You shouldn't have said that," she said, turning away from him.

K.C. leaned a little bit closer to her. "I know I shouldn't have been so angry," he replied. "But you've got me so confused. You're getting mad at me for things I have no idea I'm doing wrong. You're mad at me all the time now, and I have no idea what I'm doing to piss you off so much. "

"You don't piss me off," Jenna mumbled. She reached over and grabbed a used tissue from the coffee table, dabbing her eyes dry.

"Yes, I am, Jenna," he insisted. "I know I am. I can feel it. And you can, too. Things aren't the same. We're always arguing. And I need to know why you're always so mad at me."

Jenna still wouldn't look at him. Her eyes welled up with tears again, and she was chewing on her lower lip, trying to hold them back, but instead she buried her head in her knees and began to cry again.

K.C. stayed there, holding his hand on her knee, feeling helpless. He had no idea what to do now. He wanted to understand what Jenna was so mad at him for so they could move on, but now he wondered if that wasn't the problem. Maybe the problem wasn't really a problem, so much as they just weren't working out.

Suddenly, Jenna lifted her head up, and wiped her eyes dry.

"I want you to talk to me," she said.

K.C. looked at her, confused. "Okay. About what?"

"About," she said, taking a deep breath to compose herself, "about what's wrong with us. Why you're so busy walking out on us. Me and Jordan. Why suddenly, you're more interested in sports, and school, and pretty much everything, other than being a dad. And please don't yell," she begged, her eyes spilling over in tears again before K.C. could even open his mouth. "I don't want you to yell. I'm tired of yelling. Just, please, explain to me, why this is suddenly not important to you anymore."

K.C. paused for a moment, not sure entirely how to phrase this. Or if he even could phrase it.

"Okay," he began. "Well…for starters, school and sports and all that, none of it is as important to me as you and Jordan are. I love you both. But you're always making me feel like I'm bailing. And I'm not. I wouldn't. It's just…" he knew he had to spit it out, "I need my space sometimes. I need a break."

"And you don't think I need one, too?" Jenna replied. "Well, I'm sorry, but I'm a mom, it's a full time job that I can't take a break from except on those nights with you! That's my time to not be, and even then, I still am. Jordan comes first. She always has to."

"I _do_ put her first," K.C. argued sullenly.

"Then why are you always not around?"

K.C. rubbed his temples. He could already feel a headache coming on.

"See," he muttered, "this is exactly why I didn't want to talk about this with you. Because I knew you would take it the wrong way. You wouldn't understand what I was trying to tell you and you'd just get mad."

"What wouldn't I understand?" asked Jenna.

"That I _do_ put her first," he repeated. "But I'm trying to do these things- graduate from high school, get a scholarship to university- to help Jordan. I don't want to be my dad."

Jenna's face fell. "I want to do those things, too, K.C.," she said softly. "I want to go to university. I want a career. I want a life. But I can't stop being a mom to do it."

Both of them sat side-by-side on the couch in silence for a long moment. Jenna had placed the baby monitor on the coffee table in front of them, and through the static K.C. could make out the sound of Jordan rustling in her sleep.

"We can't be fighting like this anymore," Jenna said suddenly, and K.C. turned to her. She was staring at the monitor pensively, as if hearing something important come out of its speakers. "We need to be Mom and Dad before anything else. I don't want her to grow up without a Dad, or a Mom, because both of us had to. I want us to be civil, I want us to raise Jordan the way she should be raised- with Mommy and Daddy."

K.C. nodded.

Jenna picked at her fingernails. "I mean," she continued, "you know how it was for me. My mom was never around. And I hated that. She always put her boyfriends before me. That's why I moved in with my dad and my brother. That's why she left. She didn't want the responsibility of raising a family."

"And my parents sucked," K.C. reminded her. "I mean, yeah, my mom is alright now, but they were teen parents who never tried as hard as we are. I'm trying to do everything they DIDN'T." He looked Jenna directly in the eye. "I'm really, really trying, Jen. And I know I really suck."

"You don't suck, K.C.," Jenna said. "A sucky dad wouldn't say that they suck."

He shook his head.

"I'm just not good at it," he said.

Jenna could feel his hand shaking on her knee. She took her own hand and closed it over his, squeezing it tightly.

"I can't take care of my daughter. I can't provide for her. I can't can't give her everything she wants. I feel like I've failed." He glanced up at her. "Look, you always say that you're the Mom, but I'm the Dad, and I don't think you get what that means."

"Well, explain it," she urged. "Help me understand. We need to be on the same page, K.C.."

"I don't know if I can."

"Try."

After a pause, he looked away from her.

"Okay." He took a deep breath. "It means providing for her. Protecting her. Knowing that I can be a strong person for her when she needs me. This weekend wasn't the first time I knew I let her down, it was just the time it hurt the most. I know I'm not living up to the kind of parent I wanted to be when she was born, and it makes me feel, as a man, like such a complete loser."

He finally brought himself to look at her. "I feel like I've failed, as a man and a father."

He said the words with so much clarity and unwavering certainty that it made Jenna's tears spill over once more. He said it calmly, as it if were just a fact. _The sky is blue. Water is wet. I am a horrible excuse for a human being._

"Oh, K.C.," she said, and wrapped her arms against him, falling back onto the couch cushions so she hovered directly over him. "You're not a bad parent. You didn't fail anyone."

"Then I failed myself," he whispered. "I'm a fuck-up. I always blamed other people for my fuck-ups, but really, I'm a big fuck-up. I was just too stupid to realize that my life sucked because I was messing it up. I ruin everything."

"You _don't_," Jenna emphasized. She put her arms around his neck, resting her head on his collarbone. "You're not a bad parent. Being a parent is just _hard."_

She could feel him nodding. "Yeah. Way hard."

"Harder than either of us ever imagined."

"That's for sure."

He let out a short laugh. and she was relieved to feel some light-heartedness in his tone.

He pushed her back up so she could sit across his lap. "She's been here ten months, and neither of us know what we're doing."

"Definitely," she agreed. She kissed him on the cheek. "But you're not failing. You're helping, just by being here."

K.C. frowned. "Then why," he said slowly, "are you always telling me it's never enough?"

Jenna pulled away from him. "It's got nothing to do with that," she said.

K.C. shifted, pushing her off of him. He stood up, hands on his hips.

"I don't get what you're talking about," he said. "You're being so frustrating, you have no idea. I told you everything, and you won't tell me anything. I don't get what you mean when you say you're mad at me. Why? Why won't you tell me?"

Jenna peered at her hands in her lap. He could see a pained expression on her face, but she wouldn't look at him.

"Because it's not you doing anything," she said under her breath, still staring intently at her hands.

K.C. sat back down, this time on the other end of the couch to give her some space. "If it's not me," he said quietly, "then who is it?"

Jenna didn't answer right away. She stared at her hands, then finally let out a long, deep sigh, and turned away, staring this time at the wall.

"Me," she said, in a voice so quiet K.C. had to strain to hear her.

"I don't get it," he said. "What are you doing?"

"I'm not," she began.

All of a sudden, she backtracked entirely and blurted out, "Because I'm afraid that you'll stop taking it so seriously, and then one day, you'll just give up entirely and leave me and her."

She'd been in such a rush to say those words that it sounded to him as if this had been on her mind for a long time, and she had been dying to get it out.

He pulled Jenna back into his arms and held her gently. "That's not gonna happen," he said.

"How do you know?" Jenna sniffed.

"Because," he said, brushing his lips against her neck, "I love you. Because I love her. Because I could never let go of the two most important things in my life."

"I want to believe you…"

"But you're scared," he finished.

Jenna looked away. "You went so long without saying you didn't want to be involved…"

"Over a year ago, Jenna."

"You have no idea how much that hurt me," she whispered.

"And you have no idea how much of an ass I felt like when I realized I was wrong."

He bent down to look in her eyes. "Look at me, Jenna, okay? I love you. More than anything. And I don't want another girl."

She didn't blink. "For now."

K.C. sighed. "See, I'm really trying to tell you how I feel, and you're ruining it with all your insecurities," he replied, shaking his head.

"I can't help it that I'm insecure!" Jenna cried indignantly.

"Yeah, but now all you're doing is making more of the problem, see? I put my heart on the line to try and make you realize that I want to be with you, and you're telling me that basically you think I'm gonna dump you, or hook up with someone else." He watched her expression cloud over, and suddenly it clicked. "Is that what you think? That I'm gonna leave you for some other girl, or that I'm gonna get back together with Clare?"

Jenna shrugged one shoulder.

"You two were happy once," she said softly.

"Exactly," K.C. said. "It was once. A long time ago. And it took some bad circumstances to figure it out, but we weren't really in love. Not the way I feel about you."

He sighed. "I really don't know what else to say. I love you, I love Jordan, and it's going to take more than your insecurities to drive me away. I want to be with you. I love you."

Jenna looked at him, her expression so relieved and deliriously happy he could only imagine how long she'd been carrying that uncertainty around with her.

"I love you, too," she gasped, tears streaming, and threw her arms around him, back in his arms again.

This time, as they held one another and kissed and stroked in the semi-darkness of the bare living room light, both of them recognized that something had changed. The way they loved each other had become, if possible, more intense, more real, than they had felt in too long a time for either of them to remember.

It was as if they had both broken something down, and were now standing in the clearing, ready to rebuild.


	10. Epilogue

_**Epilogue**_

Bianca sat on the hood of the abandoned car and blew out another puff of her cigarette. She pulled her jacket tighter around her, trying to keep out the chill, and tamped at the pile of unmelted snow on the ground with the toe of her boot.

She didn't know why she had let Owen talk her into coming to the Ravine today- it was freezing outside, and her fingers were numb- but she'd needed to get away from everything. She'd needed to get out, get her mind off of things. And whenever she felt like that, the Ravine was always the place to be.

Except for now.

Even though she'd already had one cigarette to calm her nerves, and smoking usually settled her down, she felt more wired than ever. Her hands were shaking from more than just the cold, and her heart was pounding so hard she could hear it in her ears. She was shivering, but her insides felt like they were on fire, and she couldn't stop sweating.

She took another drag, sliding her free hand under her knee to keep it from shaking.

"Bianca! Hey, Bianca!"

She turned her head, and saw Fitz, of all people coming towards her. He used to be a regular with her and Owen, but after he'd gotten out of juvie, he'd stopped coming around, and now Bianca only saw him on occasion, when he was working his shifts at the Dot. They never hung out anymore, which Bianca missed a little, but she couldn't argue with the fact that she didn't exactly want to be around him anymore.

Now that he was all Jesus-y and into praying, like, all the time, she wondered where the old Fitz had gone. She wished she could replace this weirdo version with the old one who would steal cigarettes for her and share the vodka he swiped from his stepfather's cabinet. She missed the days of sitting on the bridge by the creek, their legs dangling over the edge as they threw stones in the water and took contraband sips from the thin paper sack.

"Bianca!" he wheezed. He bent over at the waist, resting his hands on his knees as he gulped for air.

Bianca eyed him coolly. "What do you want?"

He took a few more deep breaths, then tossed the backpack he had been carrying onto the ground. He unzipped it and pulled something out, dangling it in front of Bianca's face.

"Found this at The Dot on Sunday night," he said. "Recognize it?"

Bianca stared. The teddy bear in Fitz's hands smiled up at her blankly, glassy-eyed and idiotic. "I HEART MY DADDY" was stitched in bright pink calligraphy on the bare's smooth belly, and there were bright red hearts sewn into the palms. A pink ribbon was tied around its neck. She looked into the bare's vacant mirror eyes again, and suddenly felt a rush of rage so powerful that it took everything not to rip that moronic smile right off its simpering, stupid face.

Instead, she took a determinedly cool drag of her cigarette, and willed her hands to stop shaking.

"Plush isn't really my type," she replied.

Fitz's eyes widened. He leaned closer to her, dropping his voice to barely above a whisper.

"Do you realize," he said slowly, as if she were a child, "that kid could have died?"

Bianca rolled her eyes. "I don't know what you're talking about."

Fitz shook his head in disbelief. He back away from her, his hands on his hips.

"I can't believe you were dumb enough to do that kind of shit," he muttered. "You could have killed her. Or yourself. If you even care, like, at all."

Bianca snorted. "Is there any other reason you're here, Mr. Hypocrite PSA," she said drily, "other than boring me?"

"Hey, Pastor Fitzy!"

Owen came through the trees, walking towards them. When he saw Fitz, his face broke into a wide grin.

"Good to see you on this side of the rails again, man," he said. "Unless you're passing out Bibles." He eyed the stuffed animal in Fitz's hands. "Or stuffed animals?"

Fitz glanced at him, but kept looking back at Bianca, his face a mix of disbelief and anger.

"Hooked up with any hot choir girls lately?" Owen joked.

Fitz sighed, sounding tired.

"Aw, come on," Owen said, "don't act like you're so much better than us."

"Whatever, man," Fitz said dully. He said it to Owen, but he continued to keep his eyes on Bianca. "I'm outta here."

Owen's grin curled into a sneer as he watched Fitz trudge away. He turned to Bianca, shaking his head.

"Smug bastard," he muttered. "Thinks he's so much better than us. Well, none of us ever spent time in juvie. Thank God for that." He chuckled at his own joke. "No pun intended. What'd he say?"

Bianca turned away. "Nothing."

His eyebrows raised slightly. "Well, it must have been _something."_

"Lay off, Owen," she snapped.

Owen's arm suddenly came around her.

"Hey!" she shrieked, jumping off the car. "What the hell! Hands off."

"What's this?" he answered with a laugh. "A present from Jesus Fitzgerald?"

He held up the teddy bear between his thumb and forefinger, dangling it in the air. He looked over at Bianca and laughed.

"Something I need to know?" he said, in between laughs.

Bianca snatched it away. "It's nothing, okay? Just go away."

Owen glanced at her, then at the bear, then back at her, and it suddenly seemed to click.

"Bee," he said, "you know that he doesn't have any actual proof on you, right?"

Bianca glared at him. Snatching the bear out of his hands, she grabbed her bag and turned her back on him, heading for the path in woods that lead towards the main road.

"Bee!" Owen shouted at her retreating backside. She ignored him, marching through the melting show, her curls whipping around her face as she stomped off.

"You didn't do anything wrong!" he yelled after her. "What happened wasn't your fault. It was an accident. And nobody can pin it on you!"

Bianca stopped at the edge of the clearing. She turned around slowly, facing Owen, who was leaning casually against the hood of the old, stripped-down car.

"There's just you and me," he called. "No one else. You just keep your mouth shut, and it'll stay that way."

He came over to her, leaning close enough so that only they could hear.

"Look," he told her. "It's not like anyone has any proof that the kid got the drugs from us. Hell, we don't even know if she even got the drugs to begin with."

"Ron-Ron gave me four pills in total," Bianca hissed. "When I looked in the bag, there were only two left. Something happened to those other two pills, Owen, and they didn't just disappear."

"Maybe they fell out of your handbag," Owen whispered back.

"Then how do you explain the baby ending up in the hospital?" she countered

Owen shrugged. "Coincidence," he said. "Neither one of them really said what happened. It was probably just some freak thing, like everybody's saying."

Bianca glared at him. "Or maybe it was something else."

Owen rolled his eyes.

"Jesus fucking Christ, Bee," he complained. "Are you really gonna torture yourself like this? Look, the truth is, nobody knows what really went down that night. The pills either fell out of your handbag, or you dropped them, or whatever, some shit like that. We can't prove that the rugrat took them. And we're not going to tell anyone about it, okay?"

"I thought you said that they didn't have any evidence on us," Bianca said sharply.

"They don't," Owen replied. "But you really want to go telling everyone at school you were doing E that night? Unless you're looking for getting busted by the cops for the second time this year. Then I guess you can join the Jesus Club with Fitz in juvie."

Bianca bit back her words, realizing he was right.

"She could have died, Owen," was all she said.

"But she didn't," he said. "She's alive. She's eating, pooping, crying, drooling, doing whatever other shit babies do. She's alive, and she's fine. Okay? So there is nothing to worry about. Besides, they can't pin anything on you. Here me? Just shut up, and everything will be _fine_."

Owen gave her one last meaningful look before turning his back on her, heading back to the main clearing.

Bianca watched him walk away, keeping her eyes glued to the bright colors of his Letterman's jacket, the only color in the grey, withered forest. She stared at his retreating backside until she could no longer make out his shape, as if he had simply been consumed by the silence of the dead trees and frozen wild. She opened her mouth to call out to him, but the cold air sliced her throat like knives, stealing her breath and her voice along with it.

Bianca turned sharply, walking briskly through the woods, her eyes and nose streaming as the freezing air whipped past her. The snow hadn't melted here, and even her footsteps were muffled, barely heard over the roaring of the wind rushing through her ears. It was as if the winter had muted the entire world around her, stealing not only the colors but most of the sounds as well.

The thought suddenly overwhelmed her, and she threw back her head, screaming at the silent sky.

But of course, no one heard it. The woods were isolated. She was still a half mile from the road, and too far for anyone at the Ravine to hear her. The trees creaked like a rocking chair, buckling and straining under the weight of the wind, which let out a fierce howl of its own. It drowned out her admission of pain, of guilt, of fear, reducing it from a lightning strike to barely more than all-but-inaudible splash of a rolling pebble landing with a plonk into the river.

If a confession is confessed to no one, was there still a confession?

If a cry goes unheard, was there even a cry at all?

**The End**


End file.
